[patrickyeon]

This should be a cautionary tale about contracting out manufacturing (which in today's world, nearly means "trying to make anything physical"). Nothing is particular to China, although time differences and language barriers surely didn't help the matter. I say that having dealt with trying manufacturers myself.

When it comes to contracting out work, the first time is always going to suck. This whole industry has figured exactly who needs to provide what, and what every word they use means, and you'll always miss something. Ideally, you have somebody who's done it before coaching you through the process (well worth hiring a consultant do that and save you some stress).

Less ideally, ask the people you are interfacing with a lot of questions. Clarifications about what a word means. Or how they count days. Every step of the way, ask them "what do you need from me? how can I speed this up and make it easier for you? what's the next step and when does it happen? did we miss anything?" Ask if they can send you example of the documents that they need, so that you know the format and type of content they want.

Yes, it's a lot of leg work. It's worth it when the manufacturing goes right, though. And it gets easier every time.

[ricardobeat]

> well worth hiring a consultant do that and save you some stress

Isn't finding a reliable consultant who has gone through the hoops as difficult as sourcing manufacturing itself?

[ktizo]

Finding a reliable expert on manufacture, if you are getting something manufactured, isn't a separate problem. It is one of the first tasks to accomplish in sourcing manufacture. The detail involved in something like just getting two simple injection moulded parts made that need to fit together snugly is huge, if you don't want to just bin several batches.