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Been through that a few times. Your path depends on if you want to sell/license a patent (and thus have less control over the end product, company, and profits
by brk 17y ago
Been through that a few times.
Your path depends on if you want to sell/license a patent (and thus have less control over the end product, company, and profits), or if you want to build a company (which often, but not always, tends to require that you develop more than one product, at least over time).
The bigger issue (IME/IMO) is not so much the differences between building a software product and a hardware product on the tech side, but on the legal side. Product liability issues are going to be more "real" when you have a real product, especially if it falls into a pseudo-medical application as your example above does.
Your best bet is probably to lawyer up early on and learn the ropes that way. Depending on your friends/family network, you may be able to find a connection to a decent local attorney who would be willing to work with you on a discounted rate in exchange for some share of stock or profit.
- matt1 17y agoSounds like a major pain in the ass. Are you happy that you did it? How did it work out?
- brk 17y agoI've only done the "official" route for various companies I've worked for. Personally, I've created some little "widget" type devices for home automation and similar applications. In those cases, I skipped the whole patent/legal thing, as the product did not have the lifespan or net sales volume to warrant dumping too much money into the project. I just setup a properly manages/documented LLC for liability purposes and went at it. As far as being a pain in the ass, it's all a matter of perspective I guess. I find that releasing actual physical product (typically as a hardware/software combo) is more challenging and rewarding than any sort of webapp. You have to get more things "right" and think more about the consequences of your decisions for short and long term durations when you are putting out a product that you can't fix a defect for by releasing an update to a server under your control. That is not to say that I don't respect or appreciate the webapp stuff, just that I prefer a different set of challenges.