172: Early Concept Design for a New Hardware Invention

Rob Colgan has worked for Mako Design for almost 10 years, working with well over 100 physical product startups on developing an invention idea into a real consumer product. He went to school for both mechanical design and industrial design, along with building many custom cars and motorcycles as a hobby. Today Rob is going to share some valuable knowledge on how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers can understand the key initial steps to developing a new invention idea, the product guidelines that start it all off right through to concept sketches, Computer Aided Design work, and visual renderings.

Today you will hear us talk about:

Features that function well

Sketch products out

Break down the components

There are multiple different ways of sketching

Quick doodles to get some ideas onto paper

The problem with sketching is you lose the 3D element

Start a new product on the skeletal level

Figure out how that system of components works

Skinning the product

Ergonomics and user interaction

Form follows function

Don’t stress the aesthetics too much early on

Think about use case.

The initial view sparks a lot of questions

Collaboration is core

Fine-tune the initial components

Transition from concept sketches into 

Modern design is clean and timeless

Better not to follow trends, and think about cleanliness

It’s not just you to appreciate the design, it’s the entire market.

After concept ideation, get into serious CAD software

EPISODE LINKS:

Rob Colgan Links:

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The Product Startup Podcast Links:

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Mako Design Links:

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Partner: PTC’s best-in-class software solutions Onshape: The only cloud-native product development platform that delivers full-featured computer-aided design (CAD), integrated product data management (PDM) and enterprise analytics in a single system, and Creo: 3D CAD solution that provides designers with the most innovative tools to build better products faster, such as generative design, additive manufacturing, real-time simulation, IIoT, and augmented reality.

Producer: MAKO Design + Invent is the original firm providing world-class consumer product development services tailored to startups, small manufacturers, and inventors. Simply put, we are the leading one-stop-shop for developing your physical product from idea to store shelves, all in a high-quality, cost-effective, and timely manner. We operate as one powerhouse 30-person product design team spread across 4 offices to serve you (Austin, Miami, San Francisco, & Toronto). We have full-stack in-house industrial design, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, patent referral, prototyping, and manufacturing services. To assist our startup and inventor clients, in addition to above, we help with business strategy, product strategy, marketing, and sales/distribution for all consumer product categories.