Product Development Blog » Development Stories

What is the BIG IDEA GROUP?

Sam — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 15:53:16 +0000

Inventors, entrepreneurs, and new ventures are always looking for an exit strategy for their idea. Do I sell my company? Am I an IPO candidate in the future? While those questions for the fortunate few may be asked after several years of sustained, continuous growth – there are two import ‘exit’ questions, which face the new entrepreneur much earlier. The question is: do I make the product myself or license it? Many inventors and entrepreneurs dream of the easy out : “I have an idea, I’ll patent it, and license it. Simple.” Visions of beach vacations while collecting lucrative licensing fees dance in the entrepreneur’s head. However, the reality is much different. The likelihood of licensing a product or technology in the early stages of development is very small. Many spend copious amounts of money securing patents – ready to license, only to find no one is interested.

But, there is hope out there for the inventor, entrepreneur, and new venture. A company in New Hampshire has been helping people license their inventions to large, established firms. That company is the Big Idea Group, or BIG. BIG started in 2000 to bridge the innovation process between the inventor and the big firm looking to commercialize new innovations. For inventors, BIG offers Roadshows, Idea Hunts, and even accepts general submissions. Their intent is to help find that one in a thousand invention that is perfect for Black and Decker for example. For large, established firms, BIG offers Innovation Challenges where their network of over 13,000 inventors submit ideas on open idea challenges. A recent challenge was held for Staples. BIG helped Staples design a public invention contest for office supplies to help differentiate Staples products from commodity goods, drive traffic into stores, and generate positive PR. In the first year, the contest generated 8500 entries, received national U.S. media coverage, and led to the launch of four innovative products.

FlashPoint has had a relationship with BIG since 2004. In April 2004 an inventor approached FlashPoint to help try and commercialize his product, a new type of personal flotation device. It was designed to replace the life jacket through a very comfortable and easy to wear automatically inflating belt. It was tested and certified by the Coast Guard – it really worked as promised. Actually a sad story – the inventor had spent his life savings on the project – gone through a divorce, and was living in near poverty, exhausted and desperate. I was sold on the product, and committed to the inventor to work for a percentage on sales if we could get it to market. We developed marketing materials, detailed commercialization plans, and hit the road to try to sell it. We presented the product to BIG and they were excited too. In fact, they agreed to sponsor an airing of 5,000 units on QVC. We were on our way. Unfortunately, when we tried to line up the manufacturing, the inventor’s contract manufacturer did not have the capacity to fabricate the units. We found another supplier but the inventor could not raise the funds for the QVC inventory. We tried to secure angel investment, but we could not get a deal closed. All investors were not happy 7 years had elapsed on the patent, and had concerns with the inventor. So we had to fill BIG in on the bad news. As with many failed inventors and inventions – there are often sad stories behind them – and many what ifs. A lesson to be learned – do not spend all of your life’s savings and run out of funds and energy before you get to market. Have a clear commercialization strategy and do not hope for the best once you have a patent and a prototype. As with manufacturing, once you have a functioning product does not mean it will be successful.

So, check out BIG – if you have the right idea in the right space – your potential for successful licensing may be improved. BIG is currently on the lookout for high-potential micro-businesses.

My Idea Research

Sam — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 03:51:15 +0000

My girlfriend had a complaint one morning recently. We were both leaving the house very early and it was still dark. We had a hard time locking the door from the outside and were laughing about our difficulties. She turned to me and said what about a flashlight attached to the actual key. The keychain lights would not have helped us, it would have required two hands and before coffee we were both struggling with even one.

That weekend we headed up to Portland, Maine for some away from the city time and while she was looking for holiday gifts, I was passively looking for her keylight as a holiday gift. Unfortunately I didn’t find anything, so I thought there might be an opportunity there.

I was skeptical that no one had done it before but I had all the materials to do a prototype. However, even before playing with my LEDs I did a quick search online, only to find many many exist. Sure, none had my design and I thought mine would be better but none of the existing products that were the same had made it to the mass market.

If I was to pursue this product it would be about distribution and sales, which is fine if that is the type of company I would like to build. As you might have guessed it has now become a page in my idea notebook that will get very little attention in the near future.

The Stack Master, Part 4

Sam — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 20:18:40 +0000

The Stack Master development story continues with Industrial Design, Product Design, Virtual Testing, Prototyping, Prototype Testing and Prototype Redesigns (we like to call them enhancements). If you are new to the story, check out our past posts:

Development Project Introduction

New Product Research

Feasibility Analysis, Customer Needs and Design Tools

You will be caught up quickly and enjoy this post.

Industrial Design

The preliminary design was based off our competive and market needs, customer needs, and our designer’s creativity. After presenting the concepts to the CEO of PaperPro, we decided on a product direction. We created several variations of the direction and the Uber Fusion Curves won overall.

Product Design & Virtual Testing

We identified the critical components of the technology that needed to be designed them in Solidworks.

We knew that we had to scale up the power spring (to 100 pages) without requiring too much more force. But how much? Well COSMOS answered that question through our virtual testing. We created a graph based on those results showing the relationship between thickening the spring and the force of the spring.

Prototyping

With a good understanding of the product design and an updated CAD virtual prototype we sent The Stack Master off to China to be prototyped. We used clear stereo lithography, a common practice because it allows you to see into the prototype and observe the mechanism working.

Prototype Testing

Testing the Stack Master prototype was quick, informative and effective. The striker (part that shoots the staple) and other plastic parts needed to be metal didn’t last long, so we commissioned those parts to be made by CNC machining. This lead to more testing, but it wasn’t long before we had a decent list of required enhancements.

The enhancements should be organized to maximize an effective solution to the cause of the issue. A format that we use is

Part, organize the changes by major part
Issue, what went wrong?
Cause, why did it go wrong?
Resolution, how are we going to fix it?

Sometimes it is easier to answer questions three and four with a graphical illustration. An example of the visualization that we used is:

Once we had a good idea of the issues and ways to improve the prototype, we began the engineering changes.

More to come on our Prototype as we prepare for production and market launch.

So I’ve Researched my Product Invention, Now What?

Sam — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 22:15:53 +0000

This is a continuation of our previous post, “So I’ve Got A Great Idea, Now What? Part 1″ If you haven’t read it, please do as this post follows those previous steps. Don’t forget to USE YOUR NOTEBOOK.

If you have completed the last step you should have some similar patents. Read through the claims they are the most important part. Although the drawings help identify what the product is, the drawings are not defensible in a utility patent. As you move forward in the development, these patents will help a professional do a patent search, usually for around $500-$1000.

You know who the competition is, now find out everything about them. Internet research can teach you about the company, their product offerings and what industries / applications they are focusing on. You also need to know how their product works. Buy the competitive products and evaluate them for your need. Take them apart, examine how they were made, what technology to they use, a lot of questions can be answered by this process. This can be expensive, especially if your product competes in the few hundred dollars price range. If you wanted a cheap adventure, get a library card and start reading all the books. Product development, even if you are bootstrapping requires investment. On one project I bought ten competitive products and spent $500 out of my own pocket. Hopefully when you get investment, like I did, those costs get reimbursed. Plus “standing on the shoulders of giant’s” is a lot cheaper and easier than “reinventing the wheel”.

Now dive into the market. Uncover demand for your product. Having close (but not as good) competition helps, but you need to know the statistics. How many people need your product (total market), how large is the need for your product (market pain), how is your market growing? These three factors indicate the market potential, and directly correlate to the potential success of your invention.

Now that you know what the competition is, what the market wants and what patents are out there, you can start to define your product. Brainstorm the top 10 of 15 features that your product needs FROM THE CUSTOMER’S PERSPECTIVE. Let it all pour out. An example is on our PaperPro Part 2 post. Don’t over think the product goals initially, just put them all down on paper. Then go through and prioritize them. Then isolate the critical components, these are often the top 5. Use these as your T5+2, (we have a post about how to use the T5+2).

Sketch out a few concepts that incorporate your top critical product components. Don’t spent too much time on this because it will change dramatically, but get your ideas down on your notebook. Now things are about to get very interesting.

PaperPro Part2

Sam — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 19:03:04 +0000

As a continuation of the PaperPro Story, we will dive into the details of the first few steps Flashpoint Development executed during the development of the Stack Master 100 (aka 3000). This post will focus on the early market assessment of the 3000 for both PaperPro and the external stapler industry and the formation of the development team.

PaperPro’s internal product offering analysis showed that the 3000 contained features (100 page capacity) and a price point ($30-$40) that fit. No other PaperPro staplers could staple 100 sheets of paper and the price point was proven by PaperPro’s current products on the market. Conversations with existing customers and sales representatives displayed demand for a product with these traits.

The competition was researched online and purchased for evaluation. Although the competition had some of the functionality (100 page capacity) and sleek look, none have integrated both concepts into a single product.

The market research further defined the product goals:

Priced Competitively
Look high quality and different
Have a PaperPro family resemblance
Not look like an average stapler (competition)
Superior Functionality

With these goals and the market research in mind, Flashpoint Development gathered the required skills from our established network of freelance professionals to complete the project. The work structure was created to utilize Flashpoint Development as an external product development department closely coordinating with the V.P. of New Product Development, the CEO and an in-house engineer. Flashpoint utilized engineers, designers, prototype makes, manufacturers in Asia.

With our team assembled, the preliminary market research completed and the product development goals defined, we were ready to start development. Tune in for the next chapter of this story next week.

The Inventor’s Dilemma

Sam — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 20:27:12 +0000

Once upon a time (now) in a far away land (here) a product development company (us) came upon a great product concept. The inventor was eager to get his idea developed and because of the nature of this specific industry, time to market was paramount. The product was beyond our inventors technical expertise, required more funding than our inventor had on hand and needed a substantial company (and developed business model) behind it for it to be successful.

So what does the inventor do?

A few possible options and the philosophies that drive them:

1. Partner aka Joint Venture- The inventor should partner with anyone that can help the product get off the ground. If our inventor gives partners equity or royalties, the partners are more likely to produce. Partners in this case might provide business development, prototypes or funding (best case scenario all of the above). However this strategy can become difficult with the different groups performing different tasks at the same time. The inventor becomes more of a supervisor of several corporate departments than an inventor

2. Do it alone – A classic inventor perspective that is enforced by misconceptions of intellectual property theft, good ideas are good ideas forever and I can do anything. Time to market is important and this option can take years (even with help).

3. Raise $ – Money can solve everything and the inventor could focus on raising funds to purchase the service of the additional pieces. Unfortunately this strategy can be a catch 22, where the inventor needs to both prove the business plan and build a prototype to get funding.

4. Abandon – If I can’t do it, no one can. Obviously the worst option for a great idea. Fear of failure, idea theft and being taken advantage of drive this hopeless perspective that many “idea” people without prototypes follow like a religion.

But what is an inventor to do?

The PaperPro Story

Sam — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 15:59:48 +0000

This is the story of a 14 month adventure in which an idea was developed into a production ready product by Flashpoint Development currently sold at Costco, Amazon and other office equipment retailers. The idea was a stapler using Paper Pro’s One Touch™ spring designed system in an ‘executive’ design that could staple 100 pages. Under direction of the VP of Product Development, Flashpoint Development executed the industrial design, computer-aided-design (CAD), prototyping construction and testing leading up to the mold development.

With no previous stapler design experience our staff immersed themselves in competitive products, customer feedback and sales representative input. The market segmentation confirmed the opportunity for the 3000 and defined the product from the customer’s and PaperPro’s perspective. FlashPoint designed a feasibility analysis maintaining the current patent protection of PaperPro which also provided positive results.

The 3000 looked promising from these early-stages and with PaperPro’s approval we began the industrial design. The Heritage design was chosen and the Uber Fusion Curves variation was selected for prototyping. Based on these designs we began the computer aided design that integrated our industrial design with the technology variations from our feasibility analysis.

3000 version 1.0 was prototyped in China with existing partners and was tested under extreme office operation. Enhancements were identified, designed and prototyped leading up to a design that was created into a production mold ready for the market.

For more information on the PaperPro refer to our Product Development Blog as we will go into detailed steps of each major phase of the project, start to finish.