Adrian hosts and Paul Adams, one of Sofeast's senior engineers joins him to talk about how to add surface textures to plastic injection mold tooling and get the finish that we want on our plastic molded parts.

00:00 - Greetings and introduction to textures for plastic injection molded parts.

02:55 - General points about getting started adding textures.

07:59 - Draft Angle rules of thumb for mold design with textures in mind.

14:58 - 5 Common methods used to add surface textures to the mold tooling itself.

27:46 - Key benefits of Chemical Photoetching.

30:30 - Roughness: Ra Value and Mold Tool Textures

34:27 - Using mold texture books to help specify your texture/s

37:29 - Some examples of typical textures from the Yick Sang texture book.

43:20 - Summary and wrap-up.

• Plastic Injection Mold Tooling Management & Risk Reduction [Podcast]

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• Plastic Injection Mold Tooling Management Program

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Adrian and Renaud chat about whether hiring a sourcing agent is necessary for businesses that want to purchase products from China. They also discuss the different options, such as doing the sourcing work yourself, and their pros and cons.

00:00 - Greetings and news: CNY '24 prep and visa-free China entry for 6 countries.

08:06 - Who typically uses a sourcing agent to buy from China and what types are there?

13:10 - 4 sourcing approaches the buyer can take.

14:02 - When does each approach make sense (and pros & cons)?

41:25 - Sourcing options and compliance.

43:43 - Wrapping up.

• Sourcing from China 101, Part 1: Do You Need a Sourcing Agent?

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Adrian hosts and Renaud is onboard to offer some cautionary advice about working with 'the cheapest Chinese supplier' with a focus on relatively ordinary consumer and electronic products. What might sound like a good deal could actually land you in hot water. Here's why...

00:00 - Greetings and introduction: Should we be wary of choosing the cheapest supplier?

05:35 - Warning signs from cheap suppliers.

09:54 - Do lowest prices = a stable relationship for the mid to long-term?

15:18 - Does a manufacturing contract protect you from the supplier making changes due to not being able to afford to honor low prices?

17:55 - What type of factory are you even dealing with?

24:36 - An example quote for very low-cost plastic injection mold tooling and the problems you might face in future if you accept.

27:23 - Avoiding the cheapest options and doing due diligence is a must for certain product types.

29:21 - What can go wrong when you work with a cheap/bad supplier?

33:47 - Is it really impossible to get a small factory to do a good job?

39:18 - Wrapping up.

• The four levels of Chinese factories

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Renaud hosts this episode on the EU's forthcoming directive on product liability which should get you nervous if you sell into Europe. Clive Greenwood and Prof. Simon Choi are two highly experienced compliance experts and Professor Choi brings a fresh outlook on how this affects manufacturers in China and EU importers in legal terms.

00:00 - Greetings and introducing today's topic.

04:23 - What is the intent of the directive?

06:53 - What does this directive change for economic operators on the distribution and retail side of things?

12:47 - Transparency in the supply chain.

16:56 - Even if a factory in, say, China can now be held liable for product problems as a supply chain actor under this new legislation, realistically, can an importer obtain compensation from them?

24:47 - How the burden of proof for manufacturers is changing.

28:45 - Product labelling must make it easier for any parties, especially consumers, to bring a case against a product's seller.

32:50 - Foreign manufacturers are going to be under a lot of pressure to change the way they do things.

34:02 - Why the product safety's burden of proof is on the party who brings the product into the EU.

37:17 - Will this directive even be possible to enforce in manufacturing in China?

39:38 - Wrapping up.

• How ISO 37301 Might Improve Chinese Suppliers’ Compliance

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Renaud and Andrew, Sofeast's head of New Product Development, are in the booth discussing how a supplier's quality can be evaluated and validated. In order to avoid purchasing parts or materials that will let you down, you need to be able to assess if a supplier is capable of reaching your requirements, and they're going to tell you how!

00:00 - Greetings and introducing today's topic.

01:31 - Why is supplier quality important?

05:56 - When should you start being concerned with supplier's quality and what should you do to mitigate risks of poor quality?

15:33 - Why the quality team must help to include your quality standards in the PRD (product requirement document).

22:05 - Why small businesses may benefit from working with a supplier who has in-house engineering resources.

23:32 - Doing due diligence to qualify that a supplier's quality is good.

33:16 - Checking the supplier's QMS.

35:07 - Regular audits can also uncover helpful information about suppliers.

37:35 - Formalize approved suppliers.

41:43 - Wrapping up.

• Sourcing New Suppliers From China: 7 Tips For Success.

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Adrian hosts and welcomes Kate Oliynykova, Sofeast's head of supply chain management, onto the podcast once again. This time she sheds light on how we do supplier identification for customers, sharing 7 tips for key areas to focus on and lots of advice that can help you get better results when you're sourcing from China (or other countries in Asia, too, actually).

00:00 - Greetings and introducing today's topic.

04:12 - 1) How to find a good supplier in China: Platforms to use

10:02 - 2) Key points to pay attention to when selecting a supplier

12:39 - 3) Checking certifications

17:44 - 4) Collect supplier contact info. and cross-check

21:47 - 5) Getting better quotations.

27:59 - 6) Selecting the right incoterms.

32:45 - 7) Source yourself or use a third party?

35:41 - An example of what can go wrong if you've sourced suppliers yourself.

41:36 - Sofeast's tried-and-tested sourcing approach.

44:27 - Wrapping up.

• Are Suppliers We Find On Alibaba.com And GlobalSources.com Trustworthy?

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Sofeast's CEO Renaud welcomes China business expert Angel Ho, CEO of Hongda Business Services in Shenzhen, onto the show to talk about what the business environment for foreigners seeking to do business there today is really like, and about the process of setting up a manufacturing facility in China for foreigners and all of the legal and administrative points you'll need to take care of. They also both share some of the key mistakes that foreign businesses make when setting up their factory.

00:00 - Greetings.

01:06 - Angel and Hongda introduction.

02:21 - What's the general business environment in China after 'Zero-Covid' really like for foreign businesses?

07:40 - The Chinese economy is less vibrant than before now. What is the government doing to encourage foreign investment?

11:55 - How easy is it to hire foreigners in China today?

16:41 - If a Western company wants to start their own manufacturing company in China, what's the process?

21:30 - Selecting the right area and government support for manufacturers.

25:55 - 7 Common mistakes foreign businesses make when setting up a manufacturing facility in China.

35:39 - Wrapping up.

• Check out Hongda Business Services here and see what kinds of help they can offer you if you're doing business in China now or soon will be

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Adrian and Andrew Amirnovin, Sofeast's reliability expert and our head of New Product Development, return and explore component selection (especially for electronics). This is just one piece of the manufacturing puzzle, but if you get it wrong it will come back to bite you! Luckily, Andrew is here to walk you through 18 steps that will help you choose components that fit the bill.

00:00 - Greetings and introducing today's topic.

01:17 - What is the component selection process and where does it occur during New Product Introduction?

04:20 - The component selection steps:

1. Define your Requirements

2. Select the Key Components

06:02 - 3. Analyze the Operating Environment/s

06:34 - 4. Identify Critical Parameters per component

10:04 - 5. Source the Components

15:26 - 6. Consider the Supply Chain

16:53 - 7. Check for Obsolescence

17:34 - 8. Analyze costs

21:01 - 9. Selecting Components of the right Reliability and Quality

24:53 - 10. Purchase Second-Source Components

26:28 - 11. Component Database

29:08 - 12. Design for Excellence, especially DFM

30:54 - 13. Compliance and Standards

33:49 - 14. Simulating and Prototyping the Product

35:14 - 15. Documentation and Record-Keeping

38:12 - 16. Design Reviews

41:13 - 17. Lock the Bill of Materials (BOM)

44:45 - 18. Pilot Run

45:59 - Wrapping up.

• Get help from Sofeast to do Reliability Engineering & Testing (in a China lab) - we provide reliability engineering services including reliability testing on component and PCB levels as well as the product level on various types of consumer products. Some of these tests include drop, vibration, temperature and humidity and package testing. We can customize the right tests for your product.

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Renaud hosts and is joined by Sofeast's senior engineer Paul Adams to go through Technology Readiness Levels which is a product development framework that is often used to gauge the progress of a new product launch project, especially during prototyping. But is it useful for today's manufacturers who are mass producing, say, consumer electronics? Find out here...

00:00 - Greetings and introducing today's topic.

01:08 - Where did the TRL originate?

04:37 - The 9 Technology Readiness Levels.

20:02 - Can we use this framework for products that will be mass-produced?

26:09 - What is missing from the TRL in order to manufacture products in large quantities?

37:38 - Wrapping up.

• Technology Readiness Levels: A Better Product Development Framework?

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Sofeast's CEO Renaud flies solo in this episode and discusses what he thought of the recent Elon Musk biography by Walter Isaacson. What can we, the manufacturing community, learn from this enigmatic character? As you'll hear, one of his specialities is making positive DFM (Design for Manufacturing) changes, so there will be plenty of focus on those, but also on his 5-point algorithm for success, triumphs and failures in manufacturing, and more.

00:00 - Greetings and introduction.

06:25 - Elon Musk: A great contributor to humanity?

09:21 - Automation then de-automation

11:26 - Making product design engineers responsible for the manufacturing process.

13:24 - Musk's 5-point algorithm for success.

23:44 - The 'Idiot Index'.

25:44 - Material science: The unexpected choice to replace carbon fiber with stainless steel in some SpaceX parts.

27:31 - Using a revolutionary stainless-steel body for the cyber truck.

30:30 - Changing how die-casting is used in the automotive trade.

32:23 - Wrapping up.

• What is Design for Manufacturing (DFM)?

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