Hardware in 2014 and Beyond

Happy New Year! As we step into 2014, I’ve been thinking about trends in hardware startups, hardware design tools, and the electronic component industry.

Hardware Manufacturing Services Get Fully Featured

2013 saw the launch of a slew of hardware accelerator/incubator services: Bolt, Dragon Innovation, Highway1, Lemnos Labs, MakeSimply, R/GA, Springboard, and Zahn Center. There’s nothing new about services to streamline the manufacturing process. Contract Manufacturers have been around forever. But these services add an additional layer around the process, some providing funding, and all helping novice hardware makers avoid the numerous and expensive pitfalls involved in hardware manufacturing.

What’s behind the growth of these services?

Highly visible crowdfunding campaign successes (Pebble, Canary) have raised the profile of hardware startups among people who would otherwise be working on software companies. So much so, that three crowdfunding sites dedicated to hardware, CrowdSupply, Dragon Innovation, HWTrek, launched in 2013.

Recurring revenue from selling hardware devices which couple to web based services is attracting developers who would otherwise steer clear of the low margin hardware business. The “Internet of Things” has been a catchphrase for a while, but it looks like 2014 will see a dramatic bump in these kinds of products.

Lastly, hardware development is gaining a wider audience as accessible platforms like Arduino, Raspberry Pi and BeagleBone continually lower the technical barrier to entry.

Web Based Collaboration Tools are Building Steam

Collaboration tools in the hardware design space are growing. EDA tools like Upverter, circuits.io and Scheme-it allow teams to collaborate via the web to design schematics and layout PCBs. Circuit simulation tools like CircuitLab, PartSim and DoCircuits allow for easy sharing of circuit simulations. PLM tools like Autodesk PLM360 and Arena are linking design teams with production and purchasing. And this past year, GitHub launched support for 3-D model diffs.

From a distance, hardware development collaboration tools resemble software development collaboration tools with features like version control and asset management. But there are existing proprietary formats and complicated data structures to deal with which makes building these tools extremely challenging. They keep getting better though and as they gain wider adoption, we’ll see lots of efficiency gains in the hardware development process. Teams will collaborate more effectively, and less time will be wasted repeating mundane tasks like footprint drawing and simulation model building.

Electronic Component Technical Data is Opening Up

When we launched Octopart in 2007, electronic component data was mostly trapped in PDF datasheets, proprietary databases, and paper catalogs. At the time, we thought it would be straightforward to collect all these data from component manufacturers and organize it in a database, make it available on the web, and fix the problem of part search.

We assumed that component manufacturers had their own internal databases of technical component data and that they would be eager to share this structured data with the intention of promoting their components to engineers who make design decisions. It turned out that manufacturers did want their component data to be open and available. But with few exceptions, these internal databases didn’t exist.

We’re seeing shifts in this area. Component manufacturers are increasingly recognizing the importance of exposing their product information in parametric search engines and they’ve been putting effort into publishing structured data. From the graph below, you can see the progress we’re making in collecting component data straight from the source.

If you’re a component manufacturer and you’re interested in sending us your structured data for free, please contact us.

Hardware Development APIs are connecting Silos

Hardware development requires design tools, technical data, and manufacturing services. In the past these services were siloed, requiring hardware developers to design circuits within their CAD and EDA tools, research market pricing on distributor’s websites, and call contract manufacturers to get quotations. New APIs are allowing the specialists within each of these fields to integrate their services.

The Octopart API handles the component data piece of the puzzle, allowing third parties to integrate part search, market pricing, technical specs, and compliance documentation, into their applications. Examples of applications powered by the Octopart API include, PLM tools like Arena and Autodesk PLM 360, and EDA tools like Cadence OrCAD and Upverter, and many more.

On the manufacturing side, 3D printing companies like Shapeways and Ponoko are leading the way with APIs which will allow CAD tools to offer fabrication services from within their applications. Custom integrations of PCB fabricators into many EDA tools already exist and open APIs are not far behind. Extending these APIs to include component purchasing and assembly is the next step.

The future of hardware design is web based circuit design and CAD tools which are coupled to technical and market data sources, product lifecycle management tools, and manufacturing services.

Looking ahead

From our perspective at Octopart, there’s a lot of work to do to support this growth. If you’re a Designer, a JavaScript expert, or Python guru, and you want to be involved in building the infrastructure that will power hardware development in the coming years and decades, send us your resume and tell us about yourself. We’re based in NYC, we’re a team of 9, we’re profitable, and we’re growing quickly. And if you want to stay abreast of these trends, sign up for our newsletter.