If you're in Shenzen you can take a walk and pick up all the components you need for your prototype project in the morning and assemble them in the afternoon.
Here in the US we have to order the components from china and it takes weeks to months.
If you're in Shenzhen you can take a walk and pick up all the components you need for your prototype project in the morning and assemble them in the afternoon.
The poster is more right on than the off hand language might suggest. Working with Chinese vendors has taught me that they are business people first and engineers second. Just the opposite of most US start-ups. Several times I have been chatting with a Taiwanese/mainland vendors, when I incidentally mention a design/manufacturing/supply problem only to have them say that they have a [brother|cousin|friend|associate] who can sell me a solution. While I've often found that these referrals were off the mark or just a ploy to get a commission they have taught me that in China folks do build and maintain relationships. In the US there is a whole industry of head hunters just to get resumes to HR departments because far too many US engineers fail to build those networks to keep themselves employed. Conversely, there are places where China fails miserable. Theses weak points include design innovation, marketing, prototyping and importing (importing into China - good luck getting parts/tools quickly through customs and into China). A number of times I've seen Chinese contract manufacturers ask US customers to supply partial or full prototype parts for pilot production runs because they lack the infrastructure to work in short runs nearly as fast as a US company can have made in the US. Shenzhen and Taiwan are indeed unique manufacturing clusters much as San Jose is for development and Detroit used to be for automotive. The US need to nurture and regrow our manufacturing base to remake our manufacturing clusters.
In the US there is a whole industry of head hunters just to get resumes to HR departments because far too many US engineers fail to build those networks to keep themselves employed.
To me it seems the problem would be the very HR departments? Why do you need to bypass HR to get a job - it's fucking insane.
I say if you lose [slashdot.org] your manufacturing you lose [slashdot.org] your education and the economy. [slashdot.org]
But the reason why the manufacturing was lost in the first place is the government manipulating the money supply, interest rates, business and labour and creating a giant welfare/military state.
China manufactures [slashdot.org], thus is has the real economy. USA prints money, borrows, taxes and has no real economy [slashdot.org].
A month ago or so, China decoupled from the US dollar [slashdot.org], the idiots see it as something China is doing to 'devalue' its currency. The
Amongst all your redundant links you forgot to include a link to your Lord and Savior preaching The One True Message. He would be disappointed in you, roman.
You can also store highly volatile chemicals together with no regards to safety and pretend to be surprised when it makes a big assed crater.
All these logistic problems, all these safety norms in the west weren't added over night, but over the course of hundreds of years, since the industrial revolution. Ignore them at your peril. Oh, wait...
You only have to live in various cities to see the impact of this. I've lived in cities where you could literally go to a neighbourhood store and have access to a decent supply of components. I have also lived in cities where you would have to go across town to get something as simple as a resistor. I'll let you guess which places had thriving environments for everything from amateur to professional hardware development, and which ones had a bunch of people talking out of their assess about what they wer
here in silicon valley, we have some pretty good used surplus stores that we can run to, grab some old/quality parts and get our projects built. not high qty but for one-off POC's its great.
I've been going to halted (hsc electronics) for over 20 yrs now and I don't know what I'd do if they went out of business. sometimes I just walk the aisles in that store to get ideas. or to find some part that can be used for another project in a creative way.
china may have tons of crap-parts stores; but we have surpl
Alternatively, you just acquire yourself a decent collection of parts (from china via ebay) and there's practically no delay when building a proof of concept device. For well under a hundred bucks you can get sets of _every_ standard resistor and capacitor in 04-, 06-, 08- and thru-hole. Basically the components are so cheap you can have at least two* of everything you might reasonably need. Sure, there's often some specific chip or other you need, so digikey works great for that.
I can get anything I want overnighted. The real issue is that we have pesky little issues like UL and FCC. So, you know, our stuff is unlikely to burn down your house or fuck up all your neighbors TV's.
If you're in Shenzen you can take a walk and pick up all the components you need for your prototype project in the morning and assemble them in the afternoon.
Here in the US we have to order the components from china and it takes weeks to months.
Close, I mean, I order the parts from Texas, where the wholesaler keeps them in a warehouse and manages the "from China" part of that process. So if I don't want to increase shipping costs, it is a 4-5 shipping days wait for parts. It encourages a more design-intensive process. If there were better local parts markets, I could be more prototype-intensive.
This may be true for manufacturing, but is completely wrong for prototype work. If you need electronic parts, you call up a vendor and they overnight samples. You need an aluminum housing, you go to the machine shop across town. Same story for plastics. Same story for circuit boards. Frankly, if you are making heavy use of expedited services, there is something wrong with your engineering process.
no duh (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're in Shenzen you can take a walk and pick up all the components you need for your prototype project in the morning and assemble them in the afternoon.
Here in the US we have to order the components from china and it takes weeks to months.
Re:no duh (Score:5, Interesting)
The poster is more right on than the off hand language might suggest. Working with Chinese vendors has taught me that they are business people first and engineers second. Just the opposite of most US start-ups. Several times I have been chatting with a Taiwanese/mainland vendors, when I incidentally mention a design/manufacturing/supply problem only to have them say that they have a [brother|cousin|friend|associate] who can sell me a solution. While I've often found that these referrals were off the mark or just a ploy to get a commission they have taught me that in China folks do build and maintain relationships. In the US there is a whole industry of head hunters just to get resumes to HR departments because far too many US engineers fail to build those networks to keep themselves employed. Conversely, there are places where China fails miserable. Theses weak points include design innovation, marketing, prototyping and importing (importing into China - good luck getting parts/tools quickly through customs and into China). A number of times I've seen Chinese contract manufacturers ask US customers to supply partial or full prototype parts for pilot production runs because they lack the infrastructure to work in short runs nearly as fast as a US company can have made in the US. Shenzhen and Taiwan are indeed unique manufacturing clusters much as San Jose is for development and Detroit used to be for automotive. The US need to nurture and regrow our manufacturing base to remake our manufacturing clusters.
Re: (Score:0)
In the US there is a whole industry of head hunters just to get resumes to HR departments because far too many US engineers fail to build those networks to keep themselves employed.
To me it seems the problem would be the very HR departments? Why do you need to bypass HR to get a job - it's fucking insane.
...and that's not the end of the problem... (Score:0)
I say if you lose [slashdot.org] your manufacturing you lose [slashdot.org] your education and the economy. [slashdot.org]
But the reason why the manufacturing was lost in the first place is the government manipulating the money supply, interest rates, business and labour and creating a giant welfare/military state.
China manufactures [slashdot.org], thus is has the real economy. USA prints money, borrows, taxes and has no real economy [slashdot.org].
A month ago or so, China decoupled from the US dollar [slashdot.org], the idiots see it as something China is doing to 'devalue' its currency. The
Re: (Score:0)
Amongst all your redundant links you forgot to include a link to your Lord and Savior preaching The One True Message. He would be disappointed in you, roman.
Re: (Score:0)
You can also store highly volatile chemicals together with no regards to safety and pretend to be surprised when it makes a big assed crater.
All these logistic problems, all these safety norms in the west weren't added over night, but over the course of hundreds of years, since the industrial revolution. Ignore them at your peril. Oh, wait ...
Re: (Score:2)
Can get parts over night, if they're common enough parts.
Also, if you go from prototype to finished product in an afternoon, then something is seriously screwed up with the design review and product review.
Re: (Score:2)
You only have to live in various cities to see the impact of this. I've lived in cities where you could literally go to a neighbourhood store and have access to a decent supply of components. I have also lived in cities where you would have to go across town to get something as simple as a resistor. I'll let you guess which places had thriving environments for everything from amateur to professional hardware development, and which ones had a bunch of people talking out of their assess about what they wer
Re: (Score:2)
here in silicon valley, we have some pretty good used surplus stores that we can run to, grab some old/quality parts and get our projects built. not high qty but for one-off POC's its great.
I've been going to halted (hsc electronics) for over 20 yrs now and I don't know what I'd do if they went out of business. sometimes I just walk the aisles in that store to get ideas. or to find some part that can be used for another project in a creative way.
china may have tons of crap-parts stores; but we have surpl
Re: (Score:1)
Alternatively, you just acquire yourself a decent collection of parts (from china via ebay) and there's practically no delay when building a proof of concept device. For well under a hundred bucks you can get sets of _every_ standard resistor and capacitor in 04-, 06-, 08- and thru-hole. Basically the components are so cheap you can have at least two* of everything you might reasonably need. Sure, there's often some specific chip or other you need, so digikey works great for that.
* Pro tip - never EVER buy
Re: (Score:0)
I can get anything I want overnighted. The real issue is that we have pesky little issues like UL and FCC. So, you know, our stuff is unlikely to burn down your house or fuck up all your neighbors TV's.
Re: (Score:2)
If you're in Shenzen you can take a walk and pick up all the components you need for your prototype project in the morning and assemble them in the afternoon.
Here in the US we have to order the components from china and it takes weeks to months.
Close, I mean, I order the parts from Texas, where the wholesaler keeps them in a warehouse and manages the "from China" part of that process. So if I don't want to increase shipping costs, it is a 4-5 shipping days wait for parts. It encourages a more design-intensive process. If there were better local parts markets, I could be more prototype-intensive.
Re: (Score:0)
This may be true for manufacturing, but is completely wrong for prototype work. If you need electronic parts, you call up a vendor and they overnight samples. You need an aluminum housing, you go to the machine shop across town. Same story for plastics. Same story for circuit boards. Frankly, if you are making heavy use of expedited services, there is something wrong with your engineering process.
It shows, to China's detriment. (Score:2)
In the case of the US, one ends up with a well-designed product.
In the case of China, one ends up with a mish-mash of parts.
The latter might be "quicker", but it also breaks quicker.