Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
dead ends. Sometimes surprising things and perspectives can emerge. In an open commu-
nity, you have access to the expertise and skills of people you might never be able to hire
because you could not pay them what they are worth or because they have no interest in
working for you full time, are retired, work for someone else, or live in another place.
“The most helpful aspect of open source hardware at Aleph Objects, Inc. is the
ease and speed with which we research and develop our products to get them into
the hands of our customers around the world. This applies beyond initial product
release, including our ability to rapidly iterate and incorporate feedback from our
community to make products better over time.” (Aleph Objects [Lulzbot], very
close to being profitable, revenue of $1.7 million in 2013)
With the right context, the right product, and a strong community you can innovate
very quickly. People might clone your hardware but they cannot clone your community
and the pace of innovation you achieve with them. In some fields, having a faster pace of
innovation and being ahead of others is the most important competitive advantage.
There are a lot of different examples of open innovation, and a lot of literature about
this development pathway. How do you design your platform and product in a way to trig-
ger rich derivatives with open innovation? Which channels are you using or providing for
it (e.g., forums, workshops, labs)? Do you incentivize contributions, or present tasks and
challenges? Different products need different solutions. If everything is designed with
transparency and respects the rights of open source hardware, however, it is very likely
that your open innovation processes will produce faster, cheaper and better outcomes.
“If people are going to hack your products anyway, then you may as well get
ahead of the game. It's better than suing the people who love your product most.
Make your products modular, reconfigurable, and editable. Set the context for
open innovation and collaboration; provide venues. Build user-friendly toolkits.
Supply the raw materials that collaborators need to add value to your product and
make it easy to remix and share.” (Ahmad Sufian Bayram [author], promoting the
state of collaborative economy in the Arab world)
“We shared our schematics and firmware to our products because when SparkFun
started, we didn't have tech support staff, we didn't have a phone number, we
didn't even have a 'we.' Open source hardware means you can learn as a group
and support each other.” (SparkFun Electronics, profitable, revenue of $30 milli-
on in 2013)
For most people, it is very important to provide a channel or place where your open in-
novation can happen. But open innovation does not necessarily mean that the innovation
appears in the channels you provide for the process. For example, a forum might be set up
