Steps to Developing a New Product in a Tech-Savvy World

You have an idea for a new product – one that will solve a problem for many. How exactly do you create and distribute that product to the masses? This is the first step in a long list of steps that so many entrepreneurs get stopped in their tracks and give up their dreams. You don’t have to be one of these people.

The product development process doesn’t have to be so intimidating. In fact, it can be quite exciting and, with the right partner, can be a fairly seamless process. Let’s dive into developing a new product and the steps needed to ensure yours crosses the finish line.

Step 1: Product Idea Creation and Market Research

The first step in developing a new product is conceptualizing the idea and conducting thorough market research. Simply put, define the problem your product is trying to solve and identify its target market. By understanding market trends, customer needs, and potential competitors, you can refine your concept and gain valuable insights that will guide you through the product development phases.

Step 2: Collaboration and Project Planning

Creating a product that is connected to the cloud or other devices requires multiple disciplines and collaboration between software developers, electrical engineers, mechanical engineers, and industrial designers. Establishing a cross-functional team to facilitate communication and streamline the development process is vital to the success of your product.

Developing a detailed project plan is needed to outline each discipline’s responsibilities, timelines, and dependencies to ensure everyone is on the same page. If you or your company does not already have these teams in place, enlist the expertise of an experienced partner with this knowledge and staffing.

Creating a Tech Savvy Multi-Disciplined Team

Software Developers:
Software development plays a crucial role in any modern product. Define the software requirements and functionalities based on the product concept. Engage software developers to create a user-friendly interface, implement the desired features, and optimize performance. Regular feedback loops and iterations will help refine the software component throughout the development process.

Electrical Engineers:
The electrical engineering aspect of the product involves designing and integrating electronic components, circuit boards, and power management systems. Collaborate with electrical engineers to define the electrical specifications, select appropriate parts, and ensure compatibility with other system elements. Close communication with the software team is essential to ensure seamless integration and synchronization of both software and hardware.

Mechanical Engineers:
Mechanical engineering focuses on the product’s physical structure, mechanisms, and overall functionality. You must work closely with mechanical engineers to design the product enclosure, mechanical components, and manufacturing processes. Consider factors such as ergonomics, durability, and ease of assembly. Conduct prototyping and testing to refine the mechanical design seamlessly.

Industrial Designers:
Industrial design encompasses the product’s visual aesthetics, user experience, and branding. Collaborate with industrial designers to create a cohesive and visually appealing design that aligns with your target audience’s desires. Consider factors such as form, color, texture, and user interaction. Industrial designers should work closely with the mechanical engineering team to ensure the design is manufacturable without compromising functionality.

Step 3: Designing for Cost-Effective Manufacturing

Creating a product that is easily and cost-effectively manufactured is crucial for its consumer adoption and commercial success. When creating a new product, you must consider the following strategies during the design phase:

Design for Assembly (DFA):
Optimize the product’s design to minimize the number of components, simplify assembly processes, and reduce production time. Streamline the assembly sequence and ensure the product can be easily disassembled for maintenance or repair.

Design for Manufacturing (DFM):
Design components with manufacturing processes in mind. Optimize part geometries, tolerances, and material selection to facilitate efficient production. Minimize complex tooling requirements and aim for standardization anywhere possible.

Material Selection:
Select materials that strike a balance between cost, functionality, and quality. Consider the production volumes and choose materials that can be sourced easily and at competitive prices. Assess the environmental impact of the materials used and strive for sustainability.

Supplier Collaboration:
Engage with suppliers early in development to gain insights into their capabilities, costs, and lead times. Collaborate closely with suppliers to ensure the design aligns with their manufacturing processes and limitations. Seek their expertise to optimize the product’s manufacturability and identify opportunities for cost savings.

Design for Scalability:
Anticipate future production increases and decreases by designing the product with volume manufacturing in mind. Consider modular designs, standardized components, and automation possibilities to facilitate efficient scaling without compromising quality. You hope your product is quickly adopted among your consumers, so design it so you can ramp up production when demand is high.

If you’re partnering with an experienced company with the teams in place to take your product into manufacturing, all of these factors should be considered at the initial design phase of development. This will greatly reduce the guesswork and time to market.

Step 4: Prototyping and Testing

Create prototypes and repetitiously test the design to identify any potential manufacturing challenges or design flaws. This allows for early detection and the correction of issues, reducing the risk of costly manufacturing problems during mass production.

Step 5: Commercialization

Commercialization is extremely vital and one of the most exciting phases where your product transitions from development to market for purchase. Here you will see validation of all your hard work. You will deploy marketing campaigns to your target market to gain brand and product awareness, generating revenue. Many companies choose to relaunch their product several times, as there may be technological advances or updates to the finalized design.

Step 6: Cost Analysis and Optimization

Regularly assess your manufacturing costs and identify areas where cost optimization is possible. You should evaluate alternative manufacturing processes, material substitutions, or design modifications that reduce production expenses without sacrificing quality or functionality. Once your product has been adopted by the masses, the quality standard is set. Changing your design in a way that could negatively impact the user experience will cause your target market to abandon your product, leaving you with an abundance of inventory and a soured name.

Choosing an Experienced Design Company to Help Bring Your Product to Market

Developing any new product requires careful coordination and collaboration between teams, especially if you’re developing an IoT or connected product. You can create a cohesive and successful product by following a systematic approach and integrating each discipline’s expertise. Also, initially designing the product with cost-effective manufacturing in mind ensures its commercial viability. Implementing strategies such as Design for Assembly (DFA), Design for Manufacturing (DFM), material selection, supplier collaboration, scalability, and cost optimization will help streamline the manufacturing process, reduce production costs, and enhance overall profitability.

Pivot International has over 50 years of experience designing, developing, and manufacturing connected products. We work closely with our customers to turn their dreams into reality. Our products can be seen in a range of industries, including medical, industrial, agriculture, sports and entertainment, and oil and gas. We offer guidance in all steps of the product development process, including initial design through scalable manufacturing. We also provide contract manufacturing for customers that need more cost-effective manufacturing. Pivot owns over 300,000 square feet of electronic manufacturing space, that’s spread across three continents. If you need help developing your new product or just need guidance on taking your current product to the next level, contact our team today.

A Quick Guide to Creating and Funding Your New Product Development

Developing a new product can be a challenging and expensive endeavor, but it can also be incredibly rewarding if it is successful. In order to successfully develop a new product, you will need to have a clear idea of what your product is and what it will do, as well as a solid plan for how you will bring it to market. You will also need the capital required to support the development process.

Market Research

One of the first steps in developing a new product is to conduct market research. This will help you to determine whether there is a demand for your product and will give you valuable insights into the needs and preferences of your potential customers. This research can be conducted through various methods, including surveys, focus groups, and interviews.

Once you have a solid understanding of the market and your potential customers, you can begin to develop your product. This process typically involves several different steps, including:

Designing the product: This involves creating a detailed plan for what your product will look like and how it will function. This may include sketches, 3D models, and other visual aids to help you clearly communicate your vision to others. Hiring experienced engineers to design your product will save you time and money.

Prototyping: Once you have a design for your product, you will need to create a prototype to test its functionality and performance. This can be done through a variety of methods, including 3D printing, laser cutting, and other forms of rapid prototyping.

Testing: After you have created a prototype, it is vital to test it to ensure that it meets your requirements and performs as expected. This may involve conducting a small-scale pilot test with a limited number of users or using digital twin technology to simulate real-world conditions.

Manufacturing: If your product passes all of your tests and is ready for mass production, you will need to find a manufacturer who can produce it at scale. This may involve working with a third-party manufacturer or setting up your own production line. Choosing the right manufacturing partner can be overwhelming, so doing your research is highly recommended.

New Product Development Funding

Each of these steps requires significant capital investment, and it’s important to carefully plan how you will finance the development of your product. Some common sources of new product development funding include:

Personal savings: If you have saved up money from your own income, you can use this to fund the development of your product. This is a standard option for individuals who are just starting out and do not have access to other forms of funding.

Crowdfunding: Crowdfunding allows you to raise money from a large number of people across the globe. It’s typically done through online platforms. This can be a great way to generate interest in your product and raise the capital needed to bring it to market.

Loans: If you do not have the necessary capital for your new product development funding, you may be able to obtain a loan from a bank or other financial institution. This can be a good option, but you will need a strong business plan and be prepared to provide collateral to secure a loan.

Investors: Another option is to seek out investors willing to provide funding in exchange for equity in your company. This can be an excellent way to raise the capital you need, but it also means that you will have to give up a portion of ownership in your company.

Developing a new product is an incredibly exciting time, but it’s also met with a great fear of the unknown. Partnering with a company that’s experienced in bringing products to market can take much of the guesswork out of the equation.

Pivot International has over 50 years of expertise in helping clients bring their ideas to life. With our global teams of engineers, project managers, and manufacturing facilities – let us guide you through the product development process. To learn more about our team, contact us today.

How a Digital Twin Can be the Missing Key to Your Product’s Success

A digital twin is a new buzzword everyone is talking about. We see it in news headlines related to product development, machine learning, and healthcare. Businesses are eagerly adopting this new technology, and it’s even being used to revamp business strategies and management best practices.

But what is a digital twin and why should we care? Here we will discuss the What, Why, and How this technology can help take your new product development from an idea into a flawless reality.

What is a Digital Twin?

A digital twin is a digital replica of a physical object or system. It’s a virtual model that uses data and analytics to simulate real-world scenarios, behavior, and performance.
Digital twin technology originated in the aerospace and defense industry and was used to model complex systems such as aircraft engines. Today, digital twins are used in a wide range of industries, including manufacturing, healthcare, and transportation.

Benefits of a Digital Twin in Product Development

Simulate Real-World Behavior: One of the main benefits of a digital twin in product development is its ability to mimic the behavior of a physical product. This allows companies to test and optimize the design of a product before it is produced by replicating real-world circumstances that arise throughout a manufacturing process and may also simulate what-if scenarios to detect potential problems.

At Pivot International, we have invested in software that allows us to perform strength and production testing for products prior to manufacturing. This saves our customers valuable time and money by providing feedback before ordering materials.

Improved Design: By using a digital twin, engineers can quickly and easily make changes to the design of a product and see how those changes will affect its performance. This can reduce the time and cost of production and improve the quality of the final product.

Monitor Performance: Digital twins can also be used to monitor the performance of physical products in real-time. By collecting data from sensors and other sources, a digital twin can provide detailed information about the condition and performance of a product. This can help product designers and manufacturers identify potential problems and take corrective action before they lead to costly failures or downtime.

Optimize Production Processes: In addition to improving product design and performance, digital twins can also be used to optimize production processes. By simulating the entire production process, manufacturers can identify bottlenecks and inefficiencies and take the necessary steps for improvement. The usage of digital twins also helps firms accomplish their sustainability goals by increasing production efficiency, which in turn lowers the number of resources (such as energy and material) that are used. This can help reduce waste, increase productivity, and improve the overall efficiency of the manufacturing process – which increases the time to market.

How Adopting Digital Twin Technology Can Lead to a Successful Product

Overall, digital twin technology is an essential tool for companies looking to improve the design, production, and lifespan of their products. By implementing a digital twin, companies can reduce costs, improve efficiency, and optimize their operations. As technology evolves, digital twins are likely to become an even more important part of product development.

At Pivot, our engineers utilize digital twin technology in their designs prior to production. This allows us to digitally test a product before spending the time, materials, and money to mass produce it. With over 50 years of expertise in product development, contact us today to learn how we can help you create your next innovative product.

Powering Your New Product Development: An Overview to Battery-Powered Systems

Battery-powered systems are an essential part of many modern products, from smartphones and laptops to electric cars and even satellites. These systems enable the use of portable, wireless devices that can be used anywhere and at any time. However, designing and implementing them is a complex process that involves a range of technical and engineering considerations.

Balancing Battery Power and Efficiency

One of the key challenges in designing battery-powered systems is ensuring that the battery is able to provide enough power to run the device for an acceptable amount of time. This requires a careful balance between the power requirements of the device and the capacity of the battery. For example, a smartphone with a large, high-resolution screen and powerful processors may require a larger battery than a basic model with a smaller screen and less demanding components.

Another important factor is the efficiency of the components that use the power. Many devices use a range of different components that each consume a different amount of power. For example, the screen, processor, and wireless radios in a smartphone all use power, and the device’s overall battery life will depend on the efficiency of each of these components. By carefully selecting and optimizing the components used in a device, engineers can help to extend the life of the battery.

The size and efficiency of the battery and its components is not the only thing to consider. The way the battery is used can also have a significant impact on its lifespan. Regularly charging and discharging the battery can reduce its capacity over time. This is known as “battery aging,” and it can be mitigated by using smart charging algorithms that optimize the charging and discharging to minimize its degradation.

Types of Battery Powered Systems

Another consideration is the type of battery used. There are many different types of batteries available, each with their own unique characteristics and performance. Some are better suited to high-power applications, while others are better for low-power applications. The choice will depend on the specific requirements of the device, and engineers must carefully evaluate the trade-offs between different types to select the best option.

Battery Safety

Finally, safety is a crucial factor in the design of these systems. Batteries can be potentially dangerous if they are not properly designed, manufactured, and used. Lithium-ion batteries, commonly used in many portable devices, can catch fire if damaged or improperly handled. To ensure safety, engineers must carefully design the battery to prevent accidents.

Overall, designing and implementing battery-powered systems is a complex process that requires a deep understanding all of the challenges involved. By carefully balancing the device’s power requirements, the efficiency of its components, and the characteristics of the battery, engineers can create battery-powered systems that are reliable, efficient, and safe.

Pivot International has over 50 years of experience designing battery-powered systems for a range of industries. Our engineers are highly trained to optimize the efficiency of these systems, while maintaining the highest of safety standards. Contact us to learn how we can power your next product.

Minimum Viable Products – The Missing Key to the Success of your New Product Development

A minimum viable product, or MVP, is a concept that has gained popularity in the startup world as a way to quickly test the viability of a product or service. An MVP is a stripped-down version of a product that has only the essential features necessary to test its marketability. The goal of an MVP is to gather data and feedback from potential customers, so a company can make informed decisions about how to proceed with development.

Benefits of Creating an MVP

One of the primary benefits of an MVP is that it allows a company to save time and resources by not building out a full product before testing its marketability. This can be especially important for startups, which often have limited resources and need to be strategic in their product development. By starting with an MVP, a company can gather data and feedback from real users, which can help guide the development of the product and increase the chances of success.

Another benefit of an MVP is that it allows a company to test different versions of a product and gather data on which features are most valuable to customers. This can be particularly useful for companies entering a new market or trying to solve a problem that has not yet been addressed. By creating an MVP and gathering data from real users, a company can gain valuable insights into what features are most important and which are less important, which can help guide the development of the final product.

Finally, an MVP can also help a company to build buzz and generate interest in their product or service. By launching an MVP and getting it in the hands of potential customers, a company can create buzz and generate early adopters who can help spread the word about their product. This can be especially helpful for startups that are trying to establish a presence in a crowded market.

So, how do you go about creating an MVP? There are a few key steps to follow:

1. Identify the core problem that your product or service is trying to solve. This is the most important step, as it will help you determine which features are essential to include in your MVP.

2. Determine which features are essential and which ones can wait. It’s important to keep the MVP as lean as possible, so focus on the essential features to solve the problem you identified in step 1.

3. Build the MVP and test it with a small group of users. This will allow you to gather feedback and make any necessary changes before launching the MVP to a wider audience.

4. Iterate based on feedback. Once you have gathered data from your MVP, use it to make informed decisions about which features to include in the final product.

Choosing a company to help you create an MVP can be a valuable decision for your business. A company specializing in new product development will have the expertise and resources to guide you through the process and help you create an effective and efficient MVP. They can help you identify the core problem your product is trying to solve, determine which features are essential, and build and test the MVP with a small group of users.

Pivot has over 50 years of experience creating products from initial concept through full manufacturing. We have teams a project managers to guide you through the development process. Contact us today for a free consultation.

Five Research-Backed Reasons Why High Design Aesthetics Give Product Developers a Competitive Edge

The aesthetics of a product’s design plays a crucial role in its success. Research shows that aesthetics significantly influence buyers’ first impressions of a product. Long before learning the price of a product, buyers form price expectations based strictly on visual cues provided by extrinsic product attributes and design aesthetics. The visual impression a product makes on a buyer is far from a superficial affair. As this piece will show, companies looking to launch successful products must be aware of the competitive advantage conferred by products that are as aesthetically pleasing as they are functional.

With over 50 years of experience bringing successful products to market, Pivot International delivers leading-edge product design that drives bottom-line results. Pivot’s top design talent and DFM (Design for Manufacture) deploy advanced design applications to elevate product aesthetics and optimize manufacturability to help clients scale. Our extensive portfolio includes a wealth of design-driven, award-winning innovations that span fourteen industries, including medical, industrial, and consumer markets.

Aesthetics: A Brief History

Disciplines like art, philosophy, and psychology have always taken aesthetics seriously and appreciated its profound yet often hidden influence on human perception and value judgments. In the western philosophical tradition, discussions of beauty date back more than 2,000 years. Plato espoused an understanding of aesthetics based on proportion, harmony, and unity. Aristotle articulated a similar view by asserting that beauty rested on the perception of order, symmetry, and definiteness.

In the last century, aesthetics escaped the academy and became permanent bedfellows with the business world with the advent of modern advertising. And in the last several decades, aesthetics has been increasingly studied in relation to product development. Moreover, prominent design leaders and thinkers such as Steve Jobs have done much to make a business case for design. Consequently, in the last decade, more and more companies have recognized how visually pleasing product design can function as a key differentiator and revenue driver.

Why Aesthetics Matter: A Business Perspective

A product with beautiful form can improve awareness of product usability. Especially when the quality of a product cannot be quickly or easily assessed (as is often the case with many medical, industrial, and high-complexity consumer innovations), buyers use a product’s appearance to infer its quality and price. Especially when buyers are unfamiliar with a product or a brand, design aesthetics are an outward marker for evaluating quality and forming price expectations. Savvy companies looking to launch new products know that both aesthetics and price play a crucial role in buyers’ decision-making process. What they often underestimate, however, is how a product’s visual design has the power to bridge the gap between expected cost and actual cost and thus significantly impact sales performance.

What the Latest Research Says

A recent research study titled Effects of Design Aesthetics on the Perceived Value of a Product examined the effects of design aesthetics on participants’ perception of product value. In this strictly controlled laboratory experiment, participants viewed various sets of electronic products. Their brain activity was monitored to measure neural responses that correlate with pleasure, interest, excitement, and other positive emotions. The products they viewed were divided into two categories: high design aesthetics and low design aesthetics. Five significant findings emerged.

1. Products With High Design Aesthetics Attract More Attention

Participants looked significantly longer at the more aesthetically pleasing products and experienced more positive emotions than when encountering products with low design aesthetics.

2. How a Product Looks Significantly Influences Purchase Behavior

Behavioral results revealed that the products with high design aesthetics enjoyed a much higher purchase ratio than their low aesthetic design counterparts.

3. Design Aesthetics Can Make Up for Minor Weaknesses in Product Functionality

Given a choice between two products — one with no functional weakness and one with minor functional weaknesses — participants consistently chose the more aesthetically attractive product.

4. Participants More Quickly Reject Products With Low Design Aesthetics

Participants took a significantly shorter time to move on from products they found aesthetically non-compelling, essentially causing them to dismiss a product out of hand and invest their cognitive resources into more aesthetically pleasing innovations.

5. Buyers Will Accept Higher Costs for Products With High Design Aesthetics

Participants perceived greater value in products with high design aesthetics, whereas participants perceived products with low design aesthetics as not worth their listing price.

Gearing Up to Launch a Successful Product?

It’s not an accident that design aesthetics play such a crucial role in product success. If you’re looking for a proven design, engineering, and manufacturing partner to help you leverage the power of advanced design applications to launch a profitable product, Pivot is the partner you’ve been looking for. Pivot’s collaborative approach to doing business and one-source model ensures a smooth, seamless approach to product launch. If you’d like to learn more about how we can help you turn your product vision into a winning reality, contact us today.

Launching a Wireless B2B Innovation Poses Complex Risks. Here’s How to Mitigate Them

As the digital age reaches a crescendo, companies looking to launch wireless B2B innovations face twin hurdles. The first concerns the product itself and its acceptance by stakeholders, investors, and end-users, all of which have traditionally been the primary focus of NPD (new product development). The second is the seamless integration of the product into the broader ecosystem. In this piece, we’ll highlight why the success of a product depends as much on the second hurdle as the first, presenting a single strategy for successfully clearing both.

At Pivot International, we are a one-source global leader in DFM-driven product design, engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain management. We bring more than 50 years of proven experience in helping companies launch successful wireless B2B innovations by turning innovative ideas into profitable realities. With NPD expertise that spans fourteen industries, a diverse suite of the latest digital technologies, and 320,000 square feet of domestic and offshore manufacturing capability, we work collaboratively with clients to position their companies for market leadership.

Why Traditional Product Launches Have Posed Relatively Little Risk

Traditionally, launching and adopting a new product — provided it fell within the category of a company’s existing product line or within a buyer’s currently deployed assets — was regarded as a fairly straightforward, low-risk-to-return proposition. This was because the product was being introduced into a known market, and customers could be confident before the fact of functional fit within the broader product ecosystem. Moreover, the launch of such a product generally didn’t involve significant changes to organizational structures, talent pools, business processes, or business models. While threats of market failure will always be a concern for businesses, product launch has traditionally posed relatively little internal threat. This meant that developers and customers were free to focus mainly on the development of the product itself. Any internal challenges and ripple effects of this activity could be reasonably left to HR, accounting departments, marketing teams, and so on.

Why the Launch of Wireless B2B Innovations Poses Increased Risk

Unlike traditional, low-complexity, or consumer products, the launch and adoption of wireless B2B innovations (especially for medical and industrial markets) can significantly impact companies’ organizational structures, talent pool, business processes, and even business models, raising the stakes exponentially.

For example, to successfully solve connectivity range, device size, weight, and power consumption challenges, companies must strategically mix and match product solutions to use case — necessitating a partner with a diverse suite of the latest digital technologies. These solutions include WiFi 6, LoRa, Bluetooth, NB-IoT, CAT-M, and sensor technologies, each representing strengths and limitations. At Pivot, our design and engineering teams have a deep grasp of which combination of product solutions will best control costs for our customers without cutting corners on safety standards, product requirements, functionality, performance, and UX.

The Plot Thickens

Making strategic tradeoffs between product solutions is a steep challenge, but it’s only the beginning. Companies and their NPD partners must also make strategic tradeoffs between networks and device applications, factor in how the product will interface with complementary devices, conform to industry standards and regulations, and impact every aspect of their customers’ organizations. This is where the plot truly thickens. McKinsey and Co. have found that when it comes to wireless B2B innovations, resistance to change represents the biggest barrier to adoption at scale, especially for enterprises. Why? Because companies aren’t looking to adopt products but to improve processes. In short, companies and their NPD partners who come together to launch such products must approach the task with a sophisticated understanding of the broader ecosystem in which the product will be deployed.

A Single Solution for Clearing Twin Hurdles and Mitigating Risk

DFM (Design For Manufacture) is a specialized competency that takes a holistic view of product development and a product’s deployment in the broader ecosystem. In other words, DFM enables companies to clear both hurdles (stakeholder acceptance and ecosystem integration) with a single approach that dramatically reduces the elevated risks of launching a wireless B2B product.

DFM is widely recognized as the single most effective strategy for ensuring that product design is optimized for scalable manufacture. But it brings a wealth of other benefits. By factoring in variables that include everything from use case, UX, supply chain, distribution, and adoption, it ensures no stone is left unturned. This allows for the creation of a comprehensive plan of attack that fuels superior design and ensures flawless functional fit in contexts of adoption and deployment. Last, DFM exerts downward selective pressures by strategically narrowing the field of cost-effective options. The result is a more highly differentiated and innovative design.

Looking to Launch a Wireless B2B Product?

If you’re gearing up to capitalize on accelerating trends in digital adoption, Pivot is the partner you’ve been looking for. Our world-class DFM teams are the driving force behind some of the most successful and award-winning wireless innovations on the market, making us the go-to partner for companies worldwide. If you’d like to learn more about how we can help you successfully scale, contact us today for a complimentary consultation.

Think Smaller: How Regional Strategies Can Drive Global Growth

With so much cross-industry emphasis placed on the challenges of globalism, the role of regionalism in business strategy often receives scant attention. But even global companies — and those that aspire to become such — are well-served to examine the advantages of a regional approach to growth. Why? Because as past Toyota Vice Chairman Fujio Cho once explained, “We intend to continue moving forward with globalization … by further enhancing the localization and independence of our operations in each region.” Cho’s insight underscores the paradox that global or country-focused growth depends on robust regional strategies. It also highlights the extent and persistence of regionalization in economic activity and its vital role in a company’s business model and broader strategy.

At Pivot International, we are a US-based global leader in one-source product design, engineering, manufacturing, distribution, and supply chain solutions. With offices throughout North America, Europe, and Asia, DFM expertise that spans fourteen industries, and 320,000 square feet of manufacturing space, we help companies launch profitable products that position them for market leadership. Pivot brings more than 50 years of proven experience. Since 2016, Pivot has driven stratospheric growth with the acquisition of nine subsidiaries whose success is supported by strong regional strategies. For companies looking to scale with the launch of a new product, regional strategies can play a critical role in market success, and in this piece, we’ll examine four different types.

Four Regional Strategies for Driving Growth

1. The Headquarters Strategy

Typically, companies ease into international expansion by focusing on geographically proximate markets, concentrating their R&D, workforce, and often manufacturing facilities in or near their headquarters. A headquarter strategy can be highly effective when market forces favor geographic concentration over dispersion. Say, for instance, that a company in Ohio can design and produce sporting goods in two to four-week cycles near its manufacturing and logistics hub and can rapidly truck these goods throughout the continental US market. Although the upfront costs of domestic manufacturing are greater than offshoring, the headquarters strategy gives the company greater agility to pivot production to meet seasonal demand. It also works out in the company’s favor by lowering distribution costs, increasing supply chain security, enhancing inventory management, and reducing the incidence of markdowns. These benefits are among the reasons that many of Pivot’s clients take advantage of our domestic manufacturing options.

2. The Acquisition Strategy

When companies are aiming to establish a presence beyond the markets that are profitable to serve from their headquarters, the acquisition of companies that lie beyond their regional bounds is a common strategy. This is the approach Pivot took to establish itself as a global leader with expansive capabilities across multiple continents.

The acquisition strategy can result in exponentially accelerated growth by instantly providing access to a whole new set of competencies and customer bases. Herein lies its strength and weakness. (If growth isn’t effectively managed, it becomes a liability.) Another advantage of this strategy is a potentially dramatic reduction in risk via portfolio diversification and a greater ability to weather disruption. But while the acquisition strategy seems simple enough in theory, it is often a highly complex undertaking and can require multiple years to implement successfully.

3. The Hub Strategy

McKinsey & Co. is known for being the first to popularize this value-add strategy that involves building regional hubs that supply diverse resources, capabilities, and service offerings to the country in which these hubs are located. Essentially, the hub strategy is just a multiregional version of the headquarters strategy. (If conditions warrant a headquarters strategy, there’s a good chance a hub strategy will also be effective.) If regions are subject to very different requirements, hubs need not share resources and policies and can operate independently of one another. Conversely, when regions share similar requirements, the more it makes sense for them to operate in a mutually aligned, coordinated fashion.

4. The Specialization Strategy

This strategy draws its strengths from economies of specialization and scale. Companies that deploy this strategy rely on certain regions to perform particular roles or provide specific capabilities for the whole organization. Along with the acquisition strategy, this strategy has been central to Pivot’s growth and our ability to serve clients worldwide with a broad range of advanced expertise across medical, industrial, sports and entertainment, security and defense, construction solutions, and agricultural markets. For example, Wideblue, one of Pivot’s Scotland-based subsidiaries, specializes in sensor and photonics development, system engineering, and electronics design. Castle Creations, Pivot’s Kansas-City-based subsidiary, is our after-market specialist for electronic speed control and premium brushless motors for hobbyist and industrial applications. EDM is Pivot’s Nebraska-based ISO registered, full-service custom and contract manufacturing company, specializing in electronic assemblies with through-hole and surface mount circuit boards. And Pivot UK, a sophisticated global supply chain operation, was established to support all companies under the Pivot umbrella. It ensures that only the highest quality components are used in product design with an eye to customer pricing expectations, product reliability and performance, and protection against longer-term obsolescence and counterfeiting risks.

Gearing Up to Launch a New Product?

Thinking small — that is, thinking regionally — can be a key to greater growth. If you’re gearing up to launch a new product, Pivot is the partner you’ve been looking for. With our integrative NPD process, a portfolio of internationally award-winning products, and a highly collaborative approach to doing business, we’ll help you make your product vision a winning reality. If you’d like to learn more about how Pivot can support your growth goals, contact us today for a complimentary consultation.

Synergy: The Power of Integrative Solutions for High-Complexity Products

It wasn’t long ago that the default strategy for launching a new product involved vetting and engaging multiple firms to handle the various phases of the broader NPD process: design, engineering, manufacturing, distribution, and supply chain. But today, more and more companies are taking advantage of the benefits of integrative solutions.

What’s changed? Is it merely a matter of convenience? Is there an overarching principle that accounts for the advantages of uniting each phase of NPD under a single umbrella? Can working with a one-source partner result in a demonstrably superior outcome? Can it deliver a more secure, streamlined, seamless, and cost-effective approach to product development? In this piece, we’ll address each of these questions.

Synergy: The Case for an Integrative Approach

The advantages of an integrative approach to NPD can be summed up in a single word: synergy. Synergy tells us that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. From this principle, we can understand that a holistic (integrative) approach will tend to result in a superior outcome than that which can be achieved piecemeal. The principle of synergy allows us to think systemically and recognize that the real power and opportunity in any endeavor lie in discerning the relationships between things.

At Pivot International, we are a US-based global leader in fully integrative NPD with proven experience that spans fourteen industries, six markets, and three continents. For over 50 years, we have helped companies tap the power of synergy to seize market opportunities and transform their product vision into a profitable reality. Our teams of top talent are the driving force behind a portfolio of distinguished, award-winning innovations that position our clients for market leadership. With in-house DFM, advanced supply chain solutions, and 320,000 square feet of manufacturing capability (including domestic options), we are the go-to partner for companies worldwide.

Solving the Equation of High-Complexity Products

Understanding the nature and implications of synergy are the bar to entry for solving the equation of high-complexity consumer, medical, and industrial products. Over the last decade, product complexity has increased dramatically. A single device now depends for its success on multiple wireless, cellular, and sensor technologies — each with competing strengths and weaknesses. Calculated tradeoffs must be made in mixing and matching various product solutions to satisfy product requirements while remaining faithful to use case. Nothing less than an integrative approach to NPD and the broader product ecosystem can reliably factor the relationships between these and other considerations that include:

• Size, weight, power, and cost (SWaPc)
• UX and interface with existing business processes and institutions
• Technology systems, data security, and device interoperability
• Policy, compliance, and regulatory statutes

Medical devices, in particular, present developers with particularly steep complexity challenges. On the compliance front alone, medtech companies face a growing burden of regulatory challenges. For example, those with markets in the EU must contend with recently implemented mandates requiring device manufacturers to provide increasing amounts of clinical evidence for claims of safety and performance. Compliance challenges can be daunting, and Pivot helps companies successfully navigate the requirements of multiple regulatory bodies and compliance statutes, including:

• The FDA
• CSA Group
• The International Organization for Standardization (ISO)
• Underwriters Laboratories (UL)
• The Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH)
• The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE Directive)
• Conflict Minerals

DFM: Synergy on Steroids

While any one-source NPD partner offers integrative advantages, few offer in-house DFM (Design for Manufacturing). DFM can be seen as synergy on steroids. DFM tackles the complex challenges inherent in reconciling the intricacies of product design with the limitations of manufacturing methods. Many of the benefits of DFM are immediately apparent:

• It creates unmatched levels of integration
• It optimizes design for manufacture
• It safeguards against sunk costs incurred by “back-to-the-drawing-board” scenarios
• It accelerates time-to-market
• It ensures scalable manufacture

But the synergy of DFM also brings less obvious benefits, namely by creating conditions that fuel innovative, out-of-the-box thinking and design. Because DFM teams work directly with the tension between idealized design aspirations and concrete manufacturing realities, this leaves them no choice but to act like scientists and innovate their way forward via experimentation and discovery. By narrowing the field of viable options, DFM acts as an innovation incubator that lends to the creation of best-in-breed, highly differentiated products. Moreover, DFM expertise can play a central role in surmounting supply chain shortages by configuring product designs to accommodate alternative parts and components. At Pivot, we’ve solved up to half of supply-chain-related issues using this strategy.

Looking to Launch a Successful Innovation?

There’s a wealth of reasons why companies are seeking integrative solutions for complex NPD challenges. If you’re gearing up to launch a new product, Pivot is the partner you’ve been looking for. We will work closely with your team to understand your business objectives and product vision, and provide a secure, seamless, cost-effective path to market success. If you’d like to learn more about how Pivot will help you scale, contact us today for a no-cost consultation.

Five Touch Screen Technologies for Consumer and Industrial Applications

Interactive touch screens have become such an integral part of everyday life that they’re almost as likely to be found in the playroom of a preschool-age child as on the factory floor or in the field. And as touch screens become increasingly integrated with consumer and industrial IoT, their demand continues to grow across every market sector.

At Pivot International, we are the global one-source partner helping companies worldwide successfully design, engineer, manufacture, distribute, and deploy the latest in consumer and industrial touch screen technologies and IoT innovations. With more than 50 years of experience, in-house DFM expertise that spans fourteen industries, and 320,000 square feet of tricontinental manufacturing capability (including domestic options), we deliver a smooth, seamless, highly collaborative approach to NPD and successful product launch.

Types of Touch Screen Technologies

There are five types of touch screen technologies: resistive, capacitative, near-field imaging, infrared, and ultrasound. Each is differentially suited for various consumer and industrial applications. Let’s take a look at each.

Resistive Touch Screens

Resistive touch screens are the most common industrial touch screen technology. They are constructed of two interfacing glass sheets or specialized films that respond to direct pressure. Traditionally, the glass sheets or films used in this type of touch screen are coated with indium tin oxide (ITO), a transparent conductive material. But this material is increasingly being replaced with more advanced materials, including copper microwires, silver metal mesh, silver nanowires, and graphene.

The switch from ITO to these other materials results from the need to integrate touch functions into the LCD panel rather than manufacturing a transparent touch screen overlay. This makes for a thinner, lighter device with enhanced optical benefits. Because resistive touch screens respond to pressure, they are more reliably responsive to touch than the capacitative versions we’ll discuss below. However, resistive touch screens offer lower resolution image quality than their capacitative counterparts. They are also slower to respond to touch and can register only one pressure point at a time, therefore precluding multi-touch functionality.

Capacitive Touch Screens

Capacitive touch screens were first invented in the 1960s but didn’t appear in the consumer market until the advent of the iPhone. The strength of capacitative technology lies in its instant responsiveness and superior image quality. Capacitive touch screens function on electrical conductivity that alters the screen’s electrical field. Multi-touch functions (think “pinch-to-zoom”) are made possible by triangulating electrical alterations to calculate paired coordinates that “read” the touch location. Unlike resistive touch screens, capacitive touch screens are unresponsive to touch that does not emit an electrical charge. (Which is why it’s almost impossible to use an iPhone while wearing a glove.)

Some capacitive touch screens include a protective layer that protects the display from moisture, extreme temperature, impacts, and solvents, making it suitable for industrial and outdoor applications. For example, our teams at Pivot created a control system for dairy farms with IoT data reporting and touch screen technology that controls milk tank temperatures and wash cycles.

Near-Field Imaging (NFI) Touch Screens

Like capacitative touch screens, near-field imaging touch screens read touch commands by measuring an electrostatic field. The difference is that NFI touch screens feature a corner-configured electrostatic charge, making them more responsive to touch from almost any source. (Even if you’re wearing a glove, NFI devices will instantly register and respond.) A primary advantage of NFI touch screens is that they can withstand extreme field conditions. This makes them a perfect fit for the industrial and security and defense applications that Pivot brings specialized experience in.

Infrared Touch Screens

Infrared touch screens rely on a grid of LEDs and light-detector photocells placed at opposing positions. The LEDs beam an infrared matrix across the screen that, when “broken” by touch, provides the basis for the device to detect the input location. Infrared touch screens require dozens of components and precision manufacturing. Despite being more expensive to produce, they are often the ideal product solution for applications that include ticketing kiosks, ATMs, office automation, medtech, and even beverage dispensers like the one Pivot created with an integrated processor and customizable I/O system.

Surface Acoustic Wave Technology (SAW or Ultrasound) Touch Screens

Ultrasound technology has enjoyed cross-industry applications for more than a century. But today’s surface acoustic wave touch screens are light years beyond their earlier incarnations and make it possible to make almost any surface responsive to touch. SAW touch screens work by projecting ultrasound waves across the surface of a screen. As the soundwaves are absorbed by whatever comes in contact with the surface, the screen’s controller chip can instantly identify, read, and accurately respond to commands.

Looking for a Proven Partner With Advanced Expertise in Touch Screen Technologies?

Pivot is the partner you’ve been looking for. If you’d like to learn more about how we will work closely with your team to take your product conception to fully-fledged innovation, contact us today.