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Most people in software have no concept of just how difficult hardware can be. Add to that the fact that most physical products today are really hybrid hardwar

Most people in software have no concept of just how difficult hardware can be. Add to that the fact that most physical products today are really hybrid hardware + software, with the added feature that this sometimes means FPGA + one or more MCU's + analog + high speed controlled impedance + matched propagation delay + signal and power integrity. Yeah, hardware is, well, hard. This is particularly true at scale. Anyone can make one or a few of something. Scale it up and things get interesting very quickly. I am currently working on one such projects. One of the modules will be manufactured at an initial rate of about 5K units per month and is predicted to eventually reach as high as 50K per month. With software --and particularly with web-based products-- you can literally have millions of customers, make mistakes and fix things overnight. Imagine shipping hundreds of thousands of physical products and discovering a problem with the design. Not the same world at all. Heck, in most cases you can't even update the software after shipping. Which means you have to get all of it right before it goes to manufacturing. Among other things, I think this is one of the reasons for which VC's aren't all that interested in hardware. It's difficult, capital intensive and the risk vs. reward simply isn't on the same scale. That said, I enjoy hardware development. Yes, I do software just as much and, believe me, its a walk in the park compared to hardware, but I would not trade one for the other. No pun intended, either you are wired to like hardware or you are not. That's the way I see it.

amelius 6y ago
> Among other things, I think this is one of the reasons for which VC's aren't all that interested in hardware. It's difficult, capital intensive and the risk vs. reward simply isn't on the same scale. Hardware, it seems, is about to become a winner takes all market. And at that point you can't be a successful software producer unless you control the hardware as well.
- paxys 6y ago
  The problem with hardware is that is becomes more and more difficult for a startup to compete in a market segment as time goes on due to general technological progress. But this same progress makes writing software easier. Back in the 70s you probably had a shot at starting a computer company or silicon manufacturer with a small team and good amount of funding. Today that is wildly impossible. Software, on the other hand, is the opposite. A billion+ dollar research project from 20 years ago is an npm import away today. Two people with a laptop are more and more equipped to take on the goliaths of the industry (or get acquired by them) than they were in the past.
  - amelius 6y ago
    > Two people with a laptop are more and more equipped to take on the goliaths of the industry (or get acquired by them) than they were in the past. This is how it works now. But if hardware manufacturers start working more like gatekeepers (see app stores) then the two-person-disruptive-startup becomes less of a possibility.
paxys 6y ago
While I agree with you overall, the easy vs difficult comparison doesn't make much sense to me. Putting aside the fact that people are skilled at different things, if you find writing a piece of software easy then all your competitors do as well. The fact that you can get instant feedback and push updates now means that you have to iterate your product overnight instead of on a 3 year cycle (because your competitors are definitely doing it as well). There can definitely be just as much risk, complexity and frustration in software.

amelius 6y ago

> Among other things, I think this is one of the reasons for which VC's aren't all that interested in hardware. It's difficult, capital intensive and the risk vs. reward simply isn't on the same scale. Hardware, it seems, is about to become a winner takes all market. And at that point you can't be a successful software producer unless you control the hardware as well.

paxys 6y ago
The problem with hardware is that is becomes more and more difficult for a startup to compete in a market segment as time goes on due to general technological progress. But this same progress makes writing software easier. Back in the 70s you probably had a shot at starting a computer company or silicon manufacturer with a small team and good amount of funding. Today that is wildly impossible. Software, on the other hand, is the opposite. A billion+ dollar research project from 20 years ago is an npm import away today. Two people with a laptop are more and more equipped to take on the goliaths of the industry (or get acquired by them) than they were in the past.
- amelius 6y ago
  > Two people with a laptop are more and more equipped to take on the goliaths of the industry (or get acquired by them) than they were in the past. This is how it works now. But if hardware manufacturers start working more like gatekeepers (see app stores) then the two-person-disruptive-startup becomes less of a possibility.

paxys 6y ago

While I agree with you overall, the easy vs difficult comparison doesn't make much sense to me. Putting aside the fact that people are skilled at different things, if you find writing a piece of software easy then all your competitors do as well. The fact that you can get instant feedback and push updates now means that you have to iterate your product overnight instead of on a 3 year cycle (because your competitors are definitely doing it as well). There can definitely be just as much risk, complexity and frustration in software.