| Hi Usama. I think there is definitely potential in this space. Github has failed to deliver in this area and it is frustrating. First, you should consider IP. People who do this commercially don't want to put all their IP on an unknown platform. If you are hosting, you can make guarantees, you can be transparent about your identity, you can show audits, you can work to increase trust, right now none of that is present. An alternative option is a deployable on-premises solution. Second, a lot of money flows in this industry through iterative fabrication. You can work to tap that cashflow by integrating with fabricators. There is an opportunity to do the hard work for people in translating their BOM and design files to fabricator-anticipated formats, translating fabricator business process information (fulfillment times, design checks, etc.) in order to become a platform for iteration. This could be an awesome service in and of itself without the whole hosted design iteration thing. Third, component dealers. You can obtain forward-looking metrics about component selection from switched on component dealers, who can also allow people to secure rare stock through your platform. Some of these deals are very large. Basically, it's a chicken and egg problem. To get fabricators you need users. To get dealers you need users. To get users you need to add value while reducing risk and presenting a trustworthy and stable platform. Platform businesses are hard to build. Ultimately you may do well to reconsider your approach and instead of building a platform business just build the visual diff, BOM, fabricator DRC, fabricator order status and other industry-specific software components necessary for someone like Github to acquire you and roll out value to a large user base. This may be much quicker to return and a much larger return. Good luck. |
With regards to IP, we definitely ran into this concern couple of times. To address this we are in the process of getting SOC 2 Security Audit and post its report on the platform. Definitely agree on the identity part, will definitely have it up soon. We have the on-premise version in our roadmap for Q2 this year.
This is an interesting insight about iterative fabrication. We are thinking along these lines, for manufacturer space e.g. generating and translating the BOM and design files fabricator anticipated formats within Inventhub from source files. - Adding manufacturers directly into the partner space for placing order could be an added revenue source. We can probably come up with a utility that facilities manufacturers with their work and have them connect with our user-base. (Like cost estimation utility from source files etc). Agreed on the part of generating revenue from connecting customers and manufacturers within the platform.
- We did build a basic supply chain integration in the BOM to help user find parts from multiple component dealers, compare prices and choose the best one. Will definitely look into the rare stock supply.
- I agree, we did consider building an add-on to github or gitlab, but overtime we have ran into some engineering problems that made us realize it has to be done ground up. Also, the future vision we have does make more sense for us to host data on our platform. We did engineer the architecture in a way to port the utilizes to any git under-base to keep this acquisition door open. This is not a priority though with where we see ourselves headed though.
Thank you so much again for sharing your feedback.It is indeed really helpful.