Offshore manufacturing

You can't ensure it. The more you retain some control (eg. by supplying programmed micros or something) the better you will have this covered, but it can affect efficiencies. You could avoid places where this tends to happen, but the extra costs might cost you more than the piracy. Even some very large Western companies have been bitten. The barriers to entry are not that large in many cases, and consist of tooling and development costs, mostly.

Especially if they are making AND selling it, with only a piece of paper from you, you can expect issues. For example, they may design a slightly different (better) unit than yours and sell it for 20% less, either directly (as happened in one case I know of- the company was already making similar products, so they could't really agree to exclusivity) or through some kind of front company or trading company.

IME, the basic principle of maintaining honesty in such dealings is to ensure that, at any given time, the profit they make by being honest exceeds that could be made by not doing so. May sound trite, or difficult to maintain such a situation, but that's my opinion. In some cases, a partnership with a known and trusted person on the ground may be required.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

--
"it's the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com

I read in sci.electronics.design that Adrian Jansen wrote (in ) about 'Offshore manufacturing', on Mon, 28 Feb 2005:

I don't know one. You could omit a custom component that the manufacturer can't clone. That stops them selling any more.

The work-around is that the mfr. claims to have a lot of failed devices (and will even show you some) and pleads for replacements. (;-)

--
Regards, John Woodgate, OOO - Own Opinions Only. 
The good news is that nothing is compulsory.

Pick an established firm with a good rack record, and a lot of customers to lose if their rep is tarnished.

Pirating is the activity of pirates.

RL

1)have a custom part in the design that you deliver. 2)load the firmware at your site afterwards 3)mount a special part at your site afterwards 4)deliver every part for the assembly and be there then.

Rene

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Ing.Buero R.Tschaggelar - http://www.ibrtses.com
& commercial newsgroups - http://www.talkto.net

There was a useful article on this topic a few months ago in EDN, IIRC.

Leon

--
Leon Heller, G1HSM
http://www.geocities.com/leon_heller

When setting up to have a unit made offshore, what arrangements do people make about illegal copying by the manufacturer ? ie suppose we give a manufacturer a licence and design to make and sell x units, and he returns the sales figures as though he sells x, but in fact sells 5 * x, how do we know, especially when the product may be sold in a third country ?

Obviously you have to trust someone, but are there any clever ways to ensure the manufacturer stays trustworthy ?

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net

The only way of addressing that is to separate the manufacture and sales processes. Interpose a "send it back to me so I can do QC and insert the widget" phase. That way: (1) they can't sell more than you process. (2) they can't report high failure rates to get more of the critical widgets. (3) unless they can R/E the widget, there is no point in them making more than X units.

Hello Rene,

Also, make sure you blow the JTAG fuse, set the boot loader password or use whatever protection your devices on the board afford. That can create a situation where the cost of reverse engineering may become prohibitive.

That can get pretty expensive.

Regards, Joerg

Presupposed.

Yes, this kind of measure is better done somewhere locally. But it works in terms of IP protection. The assembler just has to know SO-8 for a part and you deliver the belt.

I propose to have a look at the production run anyway. Whenever I was having a look I learnt a lot.

Meaning I see advantages to produce locally.

Rene

Hello Rene,

That's usually all they (should) care to know about unless you make them do a full end test.

Sure. But when local biz gets taxed or regulated up to kazoo it's not going to work. I still hope Arnold fixes some of that in CA. Most of the stuff we design here is being produced in China.

Regards, Joerg

about.

With piracy concerns, high shipping and tariff costs, and lack of legal enforcement in other countries, wouldn't it be easier to set up shop in the USA, using robots to put the circuit together?

Mike

No.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

--
"it's the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com

and particularly no as the O/P is based on the east coast of Australia.

Thanks for the useful comments. That gives me something to think about. The "unique part, supplied only by us" idea sounds like a reasonably good solution, and fits with what we want to do.

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Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net

He could use a robot in New Zealand, but I think Helen Clarke is busy at present.

Ken

Yup, although "offshore" may be technically correct in referring to the US from your perspective, it's probably not the first situtation that pops into our minds. ;-)

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

--
"it's the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com

We have plenty of our own robots :-) but yes, the idea was to move the manufacturing to the US, mainly for ease of supply into that market.

--
Regards,

Adrian Jansen           adrianjansen at internode dot on dot net

"Rule of Law" is a tad more established in USA than in parts of Asia, so you're on a better thing going that way. :-) AusTrade (or whatever it's called these days) could give you leads to industry organizations, and now that the NG knows that USA is the intended destination I'm sure there'll be plenty of first-hand recommendations.

Cheers.

Ken

now

be

Adrian (OP) may be able to help you if you want to offshore some manufacturing and design.....

Ken