So much of our industrial tooling has been optimized for mass manufacturing. It's incredible what can be done to push unit prices down for large volume production.
Because of the focus on mass manufacturing, hardware is incredibly expensive to change. The industry seems to have centered around doing more planning up front.
But we (software people), learned 20 years ago (from select Hardware companies) that this is backwards. If the cost of change is high, and that's where your pain is, change more frequently. Mitigate that pain and make it a strength. (See: Toyota Production System)
I have a product with an addressable market of something like 300 to 500 units per year. That puts me in the Defense/Aerospace/Medical area, where unit economics are completely insane.
And yes. It does feel like being ripped off when someone puts ~30 minutes ($20 max) of Western labor into something and then turns around and charges me $800 for the privilege of supporting an American company.
Because of the focus on mass manufacturing, hardware is incredibly expensive to change. The industry seems to have centered around doing more planning up front.
But we (software people), learned 20 years ago (from select Hardware companies) that this is backwards. If the cost of change is high, and that's where your pain is, change more frequently. Mitigate that pain and make it a strength. (See: Toyota Production System)
I have a product with an addressable market of something like 300 to 500 units per year. That puts me in the Defense/Aerospace/Medical area, where unit economics are completely insane.
And yes. It does feel like being ripped off when someone puts ~30 minutes ($20 max) of Western labor into something and then turns around and charges me $800 for the privilege of supporting an American company.