1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,840 Kevin Mako: Hello, product innovators. Today, we learn the process and best practices of electronic product design from an EE design platform CEO. 2 00:00:07,640 --> 00:00:16,760 Kevin Mako: This is the Product Startup Podcast, a show to learn from top leaders in hardware product development, prototyping, manufacturing, product selling, and everything in between. 3 00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:21,640 Kevin Mako: Hosted by Kevin Mako, the leading expert on product development for hardware startups. 4 00:00:22,620 --> 00:00:26,440 Kevin Mako: Welcome back, everyone. I'm very excited to introduce Tomide Adesanmi to the show. 5 00:00:26,900 --> 00:00:30,040 Kevin Mako: Tomide is the founder of Circuit Mind, an electronics engineering platform 6 00:00:30,060 --> 00:00:33,000 Kevin Mako: that supports heavily improved EE design and development. 7 00:00:33,440 --> 00:00:37,420 Kevin Mako: Today, Tomide will share some valuable knowledge for inventors, startups, and small manufacturers 8 00:00:37,420 --> 00:00:42,100 Kevin Mako: on how electronics product startups are leading the charge, what best practices are in electronics 9 00:00:42,100 --> 00:00:46,820 Kevin Mako: engineering and consumer product development, and tools to improve the electronics design process. 10 00:00:47,280 --> 00:00:48,520 Kevin Mako: Now, on to the episode. 11 00:00:50,420 --> 00:00:55,840 Kevin Mako: This show is produced by Mako Design, the original firm providing end-to-end consumer product 12 00:00:55,840 --> 00:01:01,320 Kevin Mako: development services tailored specifically to hardware startups, small manufacturers, and inventors. 13 00:01:01,340 --> 00:01:05,900 Kevin Mako: Take your product from idea to store shelves at MakoDesign.com. 14 00:01:06,140 --> 00:01:07,700 Kevin Mako: Now on to the episode. 15 00:01:09,010 --> 00:01:10,510 Kevin Mako: Hi, Tomide. Welcome to the show. 16 00:01:10,830 --> 00:01:12,090 Tomide Adesanmi: Hey, good to see you, Kevin. 17 00:01:12,470 --> 00:01:14,650 Kevin Mako: It's great to have you on the show. It's nice to see you again. 18 00:01:14,750 --> 00:01:18,910 Kevin Mako: I know we've been in discussions and many of our team members have been working with you guys 19 00:01:18,910 --> 00:01:22,410 Kevin Mako: and looking at all the amazing things that you're doing at Circuit Mind, which is incredible 20 00:01:22,410 --> 00:01:24,110 Kevin Mako: for the electronic engineering field. 21 00:01:24,370 --> 00:01:29,190 Kevin Mako: Today, I'm really excited to talk about not only electronic engineering, but how hardware 22 00:01:29,190 --> 00:01:31,870 Kevin Mako: startups can look at electronic engineering, why it's so important. 23 00:01:31,890 --> 00:01:35,290 Kevin Mako: important in these days. What's happening in the world of innovations that have 24 00:01:35,290 --> 00:01:41,130 Kevin Mako: electronics baked into them? And what are some of the best practices of how to get your electronics 25 00:01:41,130 --> 00:01:47,510 Kevin Mako: invention to market quicker, more effectively, higher quality, at a lower cost and all these other 26 00:01:47,510 --> 00:01:52,150 Kevin Mako: sort of great things that are really advancing very quickly in the electronics engineering and 27 00:01:52,150 --> 00:01:56,050 Kevin Mako: electronics product design field. But before we get into all that great stuff, to me, 28 00:01:56,050 --> 00:01:59,610 Kevin Mako: to just give us a bit of a background of how you got to be the big success story that you are today 29 00:01:59,610 --> 00:02:00,150 Kevin Mako: with Circuitmind. 30 00:02:00,150 --> 00:02:05,690 Tomide Adesanmi: Still working on big success story, but let's start with a small success story. So I'm 31 00:02:05,690 --> 00:02:11,150 Tomide Adesanmi: Tomide. I'm the co-founder and CEO of CircuitMind. Before Circuit Mind, I was an electronic systems 32 00:02:11,150 --> 00:02:15,990 Tomide Adesanmi: engineer, so I used to be in the field. I used to build helmet mounted display systems and heads-up 33 00:02:15,990 --> 00:02:21,010 Tomide Adesanmi: display systems for jet fighter pilots at a company called BAE Systems. It's an aerospace space and 34 00:02:21,010 --> 00:02:26,050 Tomide Adesanmi: defense company in the UK. One day, I was just kind of looking back at my career and I thought, 35 00:02:26,050 --> 00:02:30,130 Tomide Adesanmi: look, I spent four years on a couple of different projects, took a couple of different projects, took a 36 00:02:30,150 --> 00:02:34,910 Tomide Adesanmi: $10 million. It takes four years to launch a product. And I just kind of look back and 37 00:02:34,910 --> 00:02:39,530 Tomide Adesanmi: thought, look, I spent a lot of time on doing tedious tasks that I didn't necessarily have to do. 38 00:02:39,950 --> 00:02:45,530 Tomide Adesanmi: I didn't do the best, most creative things that I wanted to kind of accomplish. And so I started 39 00:02:45,530 --> 00:02:50,510 Tomide Adesanmi: looking for solutions. And that's what brought me onto the path of developing automation solutions 40 00:02:50,510 --> 00:02:55,450 Tomide Adesanmi: for electronics engineers. So, you know, I left BAE Systems, met my co-founder who was an 41 00:02:55,450 --> 00:03:00,130 Tomide Adesanmi: algorithm engineer. I always formed circuit mind to build algorithms for electronics. 42 00:03:00,150 --> 00:03:05,610 Tomide Adesanmi: electronics engineers. We've raised money from Google, Silicon Valley, et cetera, et 43 00:03:05,610 --> 00:03:10,770 Tomide Adesanmi: et cetera, launched to many different customers across North American, Europe, and Asia. It's been 44 00:03:10,770 --> 00:03:15,590 Kevin Mako: a really great journey so far. Yeah, it's amazing. I appreciate you mentioning it. You're very 45 00:03:15,590 --> 00:03:19,990 Kevin Mako: humble, but you know, you've raised close to $10 million, including some major Silicon Valley 46 00:03:19,990 --> 00:03:25,130 Kevin Mako: backers, including Google, of course. So kudos to you. I know you've worked with hundreds of hardware 47 00:03:25,130 --> 00:03:30,110 Kevin Mako: companies over your history, your career, as well as with circuit mine. So you 48 00:03:30,150 --> 00:03:34,990 Kevin Mako: really see what's happening at the forefront of hardware product development, especially 49 00:03:34,990 --> 00:03:40,270 Kevin Mako: for electronics products, which is a huge vertical. I think a macro design more than half of our 50 00:03:40,270 --> 00:03:45,790 Kevin Mako: products. I mean, we deal with all mass manufactured consumer products, but I would say the majority of them 51 00:03:45,790 --> 00:03:50,930 Kevin Mako: have some element of electronics in it. So that's why we have a full stack electronics engineering team, 52 00:03:50,930 --> 00:03:56,830 Kevin Mako: because it is very much a requirement today in developing new hardware products to be on the 53 00:03:56,830 --> 00:04:00,130 Kevin Mako: the leading edge of not only new technologies, but new innovations. 54 00:04:00,150 --> 00:04:04,970 Kevin Mako: or reinvention of existing innovations now with electronics components. So, of course, 55 00:04:05,050 --> 00:04:10,710 Kevin Mako: in order to design, engineer, and build those hardware products, you need to have rate technology 56 00:04:10,710 --> 00:04:16,470 Kevin Mako: and electronics design in order to be able to put all this stuff together. So before we jump into 57 00:04:16,470 --> 00:04:21,790 Kevin Mako: some of the nitty gritty, just give me a high level of what you're seeing in the electronics product 58 00:04:21,790 --> 00:04:29,090 Kevin Mako: world as of late 2023, early 2024 here, Tomide. Yeah, let me give you, you know, my thought on 59 00:04:29,090 --> 00:04:35,430 Tomide Adesanmi: the electronics product development ecosystem. So I think the first thing that everyone would 60 00:04:35,430 --> 00:04:41,110 Tomide Adesanmi: agree with is that electronics products are becoming more ubiquitous. They're in everything now. 61 00:04:41,110 --> 00:04:47,150 Tomide Adesanmi: When Elon Musk is talking about self-driving cars, building rockets that can go to Mars, 62 00:04:47,410 --> 00:04:51,310 Tomide Adesanmi: when you're talking about renewable energy systems, carbon capture systems, 63 00:04:51,690 --> 00:04:58,250 Tomide Adesanmi: IOT systems, et cetera, et cetera, the kind of conclusion you come to is that the world needs 64 00:04:58,250 --> 00:05:03,450 Tomide Adesanmi: more electronics hardware. So it's a very interesting phenomenon. I think this is where 65 00:05:03,450 --> 00:05:09,990 Tomide Adesanmi: there's loads and loads of opportunity for people who are gritty, who are resilient and who are 66 00:05:09,990 --> 00:05:16,010 Tomide Adesanmi: ready to kind of dig in to building something, you know, atoms rather than bits. Yeah, that's great insight. 67 00:05:16,190 --> 00:05:20,370 Kevin Mako: And I mean, talk about what you're seeing, especially from hardware startups, because from what we see, 68 00:05:20,470 --> 00:05:25,810 Kevin Mako: there's been a massive revolution where corporations essentially are spending potentially less 69 00:05:25,810 --> 00:05:32,150 Kevin Mako: in R&D, but more in acquisition because they're letting the next hot hardware 70 00:05:32,150 --> 00:05:36,890 Kevin Mako: startup come up with the idea, develop the proof of concept, get some early units to 71 00:05:36,890 --> 00:05:40,870 Kevin Mako: sale, and then they buy them out and scale them. So we're seeing a very large shift, 72 00:05:41,070 --> 00:05:46,330 Kevin Mako: let's call it, innovation coming from the bottom up as opposed to the top down. And I'm curious 73 00:05:46,330 --> 00:05:49,190 Kevin Mako: what you're seeing being behind the tools of the trade as well. 74 00:05:49,650 --> 00:05:55,630 Tomide Adesanmi: Large corporations have become quite slow and sluggish innovation. Coming up with something new, 75 00:05:55,630 --> 00:06:02,610 Tomide Adesanmi: that's risky, that's unproven, is because of the, again, the iterative life cycle of 76 00:06:02,610 --> 00:06:08,750 Tomide Adesanmi: hardware, it's quite difficult for them to almost do a like sort of lean iterative approach 77 00:06:08,750 --> 00:06:12,830 Tomide Adesanmi: to building something very new, very risky that has never existed before. 78 00:06:13,390 --> 00:06:18,190 Tomide Adesanmi: So what we're seeing is the people that take this leap, the people that take this jump are more 79 00:06:18,190 --> 00:06:25,190 Tomide Adesanmi: of these kind of hardware startups, a smart maker in his garage, who has ideas, who wants to be an 80 00:06:25,190 --> 00:06:30,230 Tomide Adesanmi: inventor, who wants to be Ironman, or Tony Stark. They're almost dreaming. They're 81 00:06:30,230 --> 00:06:35,570 Tomide Adesanmi: almost pragmatic, but also world beaters. Those are the people that are coming up with these new 82 00:06:35,570 --> 00:06:40,190 Tomide Adesanmi: inventions. And then you have, like you said, these corporations waiting in the wings to kind of 83 00:06:40,190 --> 00:06:44,750 Tomide Adesanmi: swipe them up and add to a new business line or a new product of the portfolio. 84 00:06:45,390 --> 00:06:51,130 Kevin Mako: What are you finding that these hardware startups are looking for in order to get their 85 00:06:51,130 --> 00:06:55,050 Kevin Mako: product to market? Like, how do you get to market well? And what is the demand now? And what is the demand 86 00:06:55,050 --> 00:07:00,550 Kevin Mako: now from the earlier stage innovators, inventors, the early stage Tony Starks, as you 87 00:07:00,550 --> 00:07:05,310 Kevin Mako: say, that are trying to build their next hot hardware product and get it to market. 88 00:07:05,890 --> 00:07:12,130 Tomide Adesanmi: Yeah, I think that's a great question. So, you know, one of the things that I see from a lot of 89 00:07:12,130 --> 00:07:17,850 Tomide Adesanmi: entrepreneurs, innovators, people who want to invent is that if they weren't in the electronics or 90 00:07:17,850 --> 00:07:22,130 Tomide Adesanmi: hardware industry before and they want to build something new, when they get into the industry, 91 00:07:22,130 --> 00:07:29,010 Tomide Adesanmi: they're incredibly shocked at how archaic all the tools and all the processes are to try to get 92 00:07:29,010 --> 00:07:34,330 Tomide Adesanmi: something into market. In the software world, we're used to this idea of lean product development, 93 00:07:34,330 --> 00:07:41,990 Tomide Adesanmi: where you can come up with an idea, write some code and have a janky UI in a garage, you know, 94 00:07:42,030 --> 00:07:46,590 Tomide Adesanmi: you have all the stories of steep jobs and Bill Gates of building stuff, putting an out to market, 95 00:07:46,730 --> 00:07:51,870 Tomide Adesanmi: iterating on it, etc. The problem, though, is in the hardware world, you can have that, right? 96 00:07:52,130 --> 00:07:57,310 Tomide Adesanmi: On the first design cycle, you've made a mistake and then go back to the drawing board. 97 00:07:57,550 --> 00:08:00,250 Tomide Adesanmi: At the same time, you're trying to organize your supply chain. 98 00:08:00,670 --> 00:08:03,390 Tomide Adesanmi: You're trying to reduce your bill of material costs as much as possible. 99 00:08:03,650 --> 00:08:06,510 Tomide Adesanmi: You're trying to get the best performance, power performance. 100 00:08:07,070 --> 00:08:10,970 Tomide Adesanmi: You're trying to fit in a small form factor for your IoT product. 101 00:08:11,370 --> 00:08:13,550 Tomide Adesanmi: And you're trying to do all of these things all at once. 102 00:08:14,270 --> 00:08:19,630 Tomide Adesanmi: It's very hard to find tools that can help you to make this a more agile process. 103 00:08:19,630 --> 00:08:25,990 Tomide Adesanmi: So people are looking for agility and to get the best possible product at the end of their design process. 104 00:08:26,630 --> 00:08:27,270 Kevin Mako: That's great. 105 00:08:27,350 --> 00:08:31,610 Kevin Mako: I mean, it all comes down to you want to be efficient with your spend, you want to iterate quickly, 106 00:08:32,050 --> 00:08:37,410 Kevin Mako: and you want to have high quality product that fits whatever it is at the use cases that you're looking for. 107 00:08:37,510 --> 00:08:41,830 Kevin Mako: And especially as a hardware startup, you should really be looking at starting lean, 108 00:08:41,910 --> 00:08:44,170 Kevin Mako: not only in the design, development, engineering and all that, 109 00:08:44,230 --> 00:08:47,990 Kevin Mako: making sure you're working with folks and designers that understand that startup mentality, 110 00:08:47,990 --> 00:08:49,610 Kevin Mako: but as well, you want to be thinking. 111 00:08:49,630 --> 00:08:52,810 Kevin Mako: about your own feature set, keeping it relatively stripped down. 112 00:08:53,250 --> 00:08:56,590 Kevin Mako: We throw the word around a lot, minimum viable product. 113 00:08:56,750 --> 00:09:00,990 Kevin Mako: MVP, you really want to be thinking about what features you're going to roll out on your first 114 00:09:00,990 --> 00:09:01,910 Kevin Mako: version of the product. 115 00:09:02,370 --> 00:09:05,990 Kevin Mako: And then what features you're going to potentially scale into for your subsequent pro versions, 116 00:09:06,130 --> 00:09:10,290 Kevin Mako: whatever else that might be down the road as you use your first product to get some traction, 117 00:09:10,590 --> 00:09:14,410 Kevin Mako: some money potentially from sales and or investment. 118 00:09:14,830 --> 00:09:19,030 Kevin Mako: So looking at the product in two ways, trying to think about how you can be lean and efficient as a 119 00:09:19,030 --> 00:09:22,110 Kevin Mako: startup on the development side, but also lean in terms of your feature sets, 120 00:09:22,450 --> 00:09:26,970 Kevin Mako: offering something great to the world, typically solving the original one or two key pain 121 00:09:26,970 --> 00:09:31,410 Kevin Mako: points that you were addressing with that innovation that you originally came up with and 122 00:09:31,410 --> 00:09:36,790 Kevin Mako: not trying to go too much into feature creep. So that brings us back to the tools. 123 00:09:36,910 --> 00:09:39,990 Kevin Mako: And let's talk about, since there's a show today about electronic engineering. 124 00:09:40,590 --> 00:09:45,630 Kevin Mako: Let's talk about the electronic engineering process. Just give a bit of a high level 125 00:09:45,630 --> 00:09:51,970 Kevin Mako: of what it looks like going from redboard to circuit design to PCB design and firmware 126 00:09:51,970 --> 00:09:54,910 Kevin Mako: and then on to various stages of prototypes and whatnot. 127 00:09:55,030 --> 00:09:57,070 Kevin Mako: Let's get a quick overview of the types. 128 00:09:57,070 --> 00:10:01,410 Kevin Mako: And then I want to dip into the actual tools and software, including circuit mine and how 129 00:10:01,410 --> 00:10:06,170 Kevin Mako: that actually plays into creating those efficiencies, the quality supply chain and all those 130 00:10:06,170 --> 00:10:11,190 Kevin Mako: other benefits that a good electronic engineering team should be looking for when 131 00:10:11,190 --> 00:10:14,690 Kevin Mako: developing out any version of a product, but especially the first version. 132 00:10:14,690 --> 00:10:44,310 Tomide Adesanmi: Perfect. I love to kind of walk you through it. So the design process is just bear in mind at a very top level. On average, you will be doing three to 10 iterations to get to a final electronics design. And in between those iterations, you'll be doing prototyping and testing. So you'll be ordering these things. You'll be assembling them. You'll be prototyping them testing and then going into those iterations. This is why it's going to take you six to 24 months. 133 00:10:44,690 --> 00:10:46,610 Tomide Adesanmi: So how are those broken down? 134 00:10:46,730 --> 00:10:52,950 Tomide Adesanmi: So you have the initial point where you are coming up with your requirements and creating your 135 00:10:52,950 --> 00:10:55,530 Tomide Adesanmi: electronic circuit architecture. 136 00:10:56,070 --> 00:11:01,130 Tomide Adesanmi: So you draw a block diagram that says, I want a microcontroller, I want a Bluetooth, I want the 137 00:11:01,130 --> 00:11:07,010 Tomide Adesanmi: Bluetooth to have this range, and so on and so forth. So you create this kind of top level requirements. 138 00:11:07,370 --> 00:11:14,050 Tomide Adesanmi: In your requirements, you also want to capture non-functional things like, I want the bomb cost to be at 139 00:11:14,050 --> 00:11:20,790 Tomide Adesanmi: most this. I want it to fit in this form factor and other things like that. The next thing 140 00:11:20,790 --> 00:11:26,550 Tomide Adesanmi: you do is you then go out and then start finding your major components, the key pieces of your 141 00:11:26,550 --> 00:11:31,710 Tomide Adesanmi: component. And the problem with this is you're going to digi key, many different distributable 142 00:11:31,710 --> 00:11:38,050 Tomide Adesanmi: websites. You are reading data sheets to try to find out whether these components meet your 143 00:11:38,050 --> 00:11:43,950 Tomide Adesanmi: requirements and also are compatible with each other. So this is key. So you're choosing 144 00:11:44,050 --> 00:11:48,370 Tomide Adesanmi: major components, then you go and then you choose all other components and do what we call 145 00:11:48,370 --> 00:11:53,370 Tomide Adesanmi: schematic capture. So this is where you're selecting components, connecting them together, 146 00:11:53,970 --> 00:11:58,810 Tomide Adesanmi: adding all the things around them that make a circuit function. During this process, 147 00:11:58,890 --> 00:12:03,370 Tomide Adesanmi: you're also doing analysis, analysis on things like power consumption, cost, et cetera, 148 00:12:03,450 --> 00:12:08,410 Tomide Adesanmi: et cetera. And then after this, you do placement. So this is where you position on a software 149 00:12:08,410 --> 00:12:14,030 Tomide Adesanmi: tool, you position the components on a board. And this board is three. 150 00:12:14,050 --> 00:12:18,150 Tomide Adesanmi: dimensional because it also has layers. So it's two dimensional and then it has 151 00:12:18,150 --> 00:12:25,590 Tomide Adesanmi: layers. And then you do your routing, which is connecting the pins of these components together in 152 00:12:25,590 --> 00:12:30,930 Tomide Adesanmi: such a way that they don't cross each other. And also, there are the things that you are taking 153 00:12:30,930 --> 00:12:36,850 Tomide Adesanmi: into account like signal integrity, electromagnetic interference, and other things like this. 154 00:12:36,890 --> 00:12:42,910 Tomide Adesanmi: So this is kind of the whole end-to-end process. You're usually doing different versions, 155 00:12:42,910 --> 00:12:48,890 Tomide Adesanmi: different fidelities. If you think about like a prototype, a UI prototype, you have different 156 00:12:48,890 --> 00:12:55,650 Tomide Adesanmi: levels of fidelity. The first one, you have EVT, DVT, PVT. Evt, PVT is I wanted to just 157 00:12:55,650 --> 00:13:01,370 Tomide Adesanmi: function with the most minimal things. I might development boards, eval boards and just put it together. 158 00:13:02,500 --> 00:13:08,860 Tomide Adesanmi: DVT is I want it to get as close to the final thing as possible form factor, you know, functionality and 159 00:13:08,860 --> 00:13:12,580 Tomide Adesanmi: so on. And PVT is, I want this to be the manufacturable thing. 160 00:13:13,000 --> 00:13:16,320 Tomide Adesanmi: The process is cut across in different kind of dimensions. 161 00:13:16,940 --> 00:13:21,920 Kevin Mako: That's super helpful. I appreciate the big overview there. A lot of steps. It does sound daunting 162 00:13:21,920 --> 00:13:28,400 Kevin Mako: if you're new to electronic engineering, but the reality is the process that has been outlaid here 163 00:13:28,400 --> 00:13:33,180 Kevin Mako: really makes design robust. You start in layers. You look at it almost as a pyramid. 164 00:13:33,380 --> 00:13:38,400 Kevin Mako: You've got your foundation, which is your specifications, and then using that information 165 00:13:38,400 --> 00:13:42,940 Kevin Mako: to really figure out what your components are, drafting them together into a rough breadboard or 166 00:13:43,000 --> 00:13:47,280 Kevin Mako: roughing them together. We literally have them on a bench test, sometimes just solder 167 00:13:47,280 --> 00:13:51,880 Kevin Mako: together various bits and pieces. Then you're actually building out some of the elements as well 168 00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:56,240 Kevin Mako: that might play into it that wasn't noted as the firmware element, depending on the type of electronic 169 00:13:56,240 --> 00:14:01,080 Kevin Mako: firmware is a big piece of it. That's essentially the software behind how all these electronic pieces 170 00:14:01,080 --> 00:14:05,960 Kevin Mako: go together. You'll be starting to write firmware code as early as your original circuit design 171 00:14:05,960 --> 00:14:10,240 Kevin Mako: on your breadboard, but it gets much more advanced as you go into PCB as you're laying it out, 172 00:14:10,240 --> 00:14:14,040 Kevin Mako: as you mentioned and then further on into getting it manufactured ready. We call it Dfm 173 00:14:14,040 --> 00:14:18,700 Kevin Mako: design for manufacture grade. So you're actually ready to produce. The reality is if you follow this 174 00:14:18,700 --> 00:14:23,540 Kevin Mako: process with people who know what they're doing and are seasoned, especially working in a startup 175 00:14:23,540 --> 00:14:29,260 Kevin Mako: mentality, it isn't nearly as complicated as it sounds because it's very isolated to your core 176 00:14:29,260 --> 00:14:33,520 Kevin Mako: components, the core variables that you put together, everything reverting back to the vision, 177 00:14:33,700 --> 00:14:37,600 Kevin Mako: which is the specification document that you have. And at the end of the day, if you follow this 178 00:14:37,600 --> 00:14:40,220 Kevin Mako: process, if you don't skip step, 179 00:14:40,240 --> 00:14:46,160 Kevin Mako: If you don't try and shortcut really key and really important developmental learning elements 180 00:14:46,160 --> 00:14:51,620 Kevin Mako: and experimentation and testing of these things, as you mentioned, that's a piece that happens 181 00:14:51,620 --> 00:14:56,840 Kevin Mako: between iterations of prototypes. If you follow that process, at the end of the day, you end up 182 00:14:56,840 --> 00:15:01,820 Kevin Mako: with a world-class product. And that is really phenomenal, not only because you've now achieved 183 00:15:01,820 --> 00:15:05,620 Kevin Mako: the functionality that you want, the features that you want, it's the real thing, the real product, 184 00:15:06,000 --> 00:15:10,220 Kevin Mako: but you've created a tremendous amount of intellectual property along that path as well. 185 00:15:10,240 --> 00:15:16,380 Kevin Mako: You've got really a fantastic system now, both hardware, underlying firmware and software 186 00:15:16,380 --> 00:15:20,940 Kevin Mako: and use case and whatever else, that is your proprietary value to the product, or at least 187 00:15:20,940 --> 00:15:25,320 Kevin Mako: much of it is likely at that point, especially if it's a custom design product from scratch, 188 00:15:25,660 --> 00:15:31,360 Kevin Mako: much of it is likely proprietary and gives you a tremendous amount of IP value to your product, 189 00:15:31,580 --> 00:15:35,180 Kevin Mako: let alone, of course, user value because we want it to be a great product at the end of the day. 190 00:15:35,560 --> 00:15:40,100 Kevin Mako: So let's drill down. I want to finish out the episode here talking about specific 191 00:15:40,100 --> 00:15:44,840 Kevin Mako: tools and how circuit mine is improving the process, how it's making it more efficient, 192 00:15:44,960 --> 00:15:50,420 Kevin Mako: how it's using AI to help these processes, better quality, better integration with everything 193 00:15:50,420 --> 00:15:55,680 Kevin Mako: from ideation to supply chain. Talk a bit about circuit mine, how it works and how it's improving 194 00:15:55,680 --> 00:15:59,680 Kevin Mako: the lives of designers and engineers. I know we very much appreciate the work that you guys 195 00:15:59,680 --> 00:16:04,300 Kevin Mako: are doing at Mako Design. So give everybody a bit of a technical understanding, whether 196 00:16:04,300 --> 00:16:08,900 Kevin Mako: you're a technical founder or non-technical. This is important that you're working in the right way with 197 00:16:08,900 --> 00:16:13,460 Kevin Mako: your teams. And Tomide can give you a description of really how that's done best practices 198 00:16:13,460 --> 00:16:20,260 Tomide Adesanmi: today. So you perfectly articulated on that process. And one of the things I would say is there's a reason 199 00:16:20,260 --> 00:16:27,900 Tomide Adesanmi: why the process has evolved to that. It's basically been extremely experienced engineers working for 200 00:16:27,900 --> 00:16:33,860 Tomide Adesanmi: decades to come up with the process that's bulletproof to get you to a product that actually 201 00:16:33,860 --> 00:16:38,740 Tomide Adesanmi: really works. And so what we do at Circuit Mind is we try to help you 202 00:16:38,740 --> 00:16:42,540 Tomide Adesanmi: There's four main things that we're trying to really help in that process. The first 203 00:16:42,540 --> 00:16:49,880 Tomide Adesanmi: one is, can we rapidly speed up that process? So the process that I mentioned from going from 204 00:16:49,880 --> 00:16:54,320 Tomide Adesanmi: that idea, the concept, those major components, getting a schematic captured and analysis on 205 00:16:54,320 --> 00:17:01,040 Tomide Adesanmi: that schematic, we want to make you a thousand times faster in doing that. That's the first thing. 206 00:17:01,040 --> 00:17:04,860 Tomide Adesanmi: One thousand thousand times faster. And it's actually much more than that, but I think 207 00:17:04,860 --> 00:17:08,760 Tomide Adesanmi: one thousand times just captures the imagination. The second one one, 208 00:17:08,780 --> 00:17:14,280 Tomide Adesanmi: is to help you optimize your design. Because right now, because you have so many 209 00:17:14,280 --> 00:17:19,220 Tomide Adesanmi: hundreds of thousands of, you know, major ICs out there, integrated circuits, the major 210 00:17:19,220 --> 00:17:25,620 Tomide Adesanmi: components. So you're not really optimizing for performance cost, power size. We want you to get the 211 00:17:25,620 --> 00:17:32,020 Tomide Adesanmi: most optimized design for your need. So if you are an IoT startup and you want a long battery life, 212 00:17:32,020 --> 00:17:36,840 Tomide Adesanmi: right now you're able to do a design that's giving you three weeks of battery life. Can you double that? 213 00:17:37,300 --> 00:17:38,760 Tomide Adesanmi: The third one is the iterative. 214 00:17:38,780 --> 00:17:42,820 Tomide Adesanmi: iterations you should do in your design process should come because you're doing exactly 215 00:17:42,820 --> 00:17:47,400 Tomide Adesanmi: what you said, Kevin, which is you're starting from a stripped down version and just adding 216 00:17:47,400 --> 00:17:53,440 Tomide Adesanmi: more. Not because you have making mistakes, but that happens all the time. Every single 217 00:17:53,440 --> 00:17:57,920 Tomide Adesanmi: time you'll make a mistake and you have to do an iteration and then reducing respins from 218 00:17:57,920 --> 00:18:01,900 Tomide Adesanmi: chip availability issues. So that's what we're trying to do. Speed you up, optimize, 219 00:18:02,480 --> 00:18:07,540 Tomide Adesanmi: prevent respins from errors and availability issues. So that's what circuit mind does. 220 00:18:07,540 --> 00:18:13,300 Tomide Adesanmi: And what we use is deterministic algorithms that can help you go from architecture. 221 00:18:13,900 --> 00:18:18,860 Tomide Adesanmi: So that block diagram, high level requirements, to a completed schematic capture, 222 00:18:19,420 --> 00:18:25,160 Tomide Adesanmi: that's what the platform does. So here's how it works. This platform would sit alongside all 223 00:18:25,160 --> 00:18:29,940 Tomide Adesanmi: your electronic computer-aided design tools that exist today. It's not replacing anything. 224 00:18:30,120 --> 00:18:33,760 Tomide Adesanmi: It sits on top of them to help you generate a design you can build on top of it. 225 00:18:34,360 --> 00:18:37,360 Tomide Adesanmi: It focuses on the front end of your design process. So that's that. 226 00:18:37,540 --> 00:18:42,500 Tomide Adesanmi: architecture, that component selection, schematic capture, and analysis, like supply chain 227 00:18:42,500 --> 00:18:49,060 Tomide Adesanmi: and bomb analysis, and verification. So you specify your requirements as a block diagram at a high 228 00:18:49,060 --> 00:18:54,400 Tomide Adesanmi: level. Most people will have a block diagram, either in PowerPoint, on a piece of paper, etc. 229 00:18:54,760 --> 00:18:59,820 Tomide Adesanmi: You can specify lower level requirements on each block. Oh, I want my microcontroller to be from 230 00:18:59,820 --> 00:19:05,060 Tomide Adesanmi: ST. I want to make my memory size greater than or equal to 30 megabits, whatever you want. 231 00:19:05,460 --> 00:19:07,500 Tomide Adesanmi: You can specify with sliders, tradeoffs. 232 00:19:07,540 --> 00:19:11,420 Tomide Adesanmi: like cost, size, power, availability of components. 233 00:19:11,720 --> 00:19:12,200 Tomide Adesanmi: Click a button. 234 00:19:12,860 --> 00:19:16,640 Tomide Adesanmi: The platform will look at quintillions of potential design options. 235 00:19:17,240 --> 00:19:18,260 Tomide Adesanmi: Check for compatibility. 236 00:19:19,160 --> 00:19:20,700 Tomide Adesanmi: Check for all the addresses. 237 00:19:21,040 --> 00:19:21,940 Tomide Adesanmi: Check for registers. 238 00:19:22,200 --> 00:19:22,960 Tomide Adesanmi: All of that stuff. 239 00:19:23,780 --> 00:19:25,120 Tomide Adesanmi: Connect the components together. 240 00:19:25,380 --> 00:19:27,200 Tomide Adesanmi: Add all the supplementary components. 241 00:19:27,920 --> 00:19:31,080 Tomide Adesanmi: Pull-ups, pull-ups, pull-downs the coupling capacitors, and get you an answer. 242 00:19:31,640 --> 00:19:34,660 Tomide Adesanmi: And kind of this is the key to the platform, this solution, exploration, 243 00:19:34,660 --> 00:19:37,460 Tomide Adesanmi: and initial design that you can build on top of. 244 00:19:37,540 --> 00:19:41,960 Kevin Mako: Well, to be, we really appreciate the work that you're doing because you make the job of 245 00:19:41,960 --> 00:19:47,920 Kevin Mako: designers and engineers and testers and all of that easier and everything's constantly improving. 246 00:19:48,060 --> 00:19:52,520 Kevin Mako: And that's one of the big themes with electronic engineering is every year there's more tools 247 00:19:52,520 --> 00:19:57,840 Kevin Mako: and more systems and more algorithms, more improvements to the existing software and so on 248 00:19:57,840 --> 00:20:03,780 Kevin Mako: that makes it more accessible for hardware startup specifically that don't have potentially 249 00:20:03,780 --> 00:20:08,280 Kevin Mako: big budgets or long timelines to be able to get their ideas from what's in their 250 00:20:08,280 --> 00:20:10,200 Kevin Mako: head to a manufactured product. 251 00:20:10,700 --> 00:20:11,460 Kevin Mako: And that's what's key. 252 00:20:11,620 --> 00:20:13,980 Kevin Mako: The key is to be on the leading edge of those innovations. 253 00:20:14,280 --> 00:20:19,140 Kevin Mako: So as you're designing and developing these products, you can get to market faster at a higher 254 00:20:19,140 --> 00:20:24,360 Kevin Mako: quality or more iterations or whatever else it is that is adding value to the hardware startup 255 00:20:24,360 --> 00:20:27,840 Kevin Mako: so that hardware startups can get to market with more product. 256 00:20:27,840 --> 00:20:32,060 Kevin Mako: And that at the end of the day is a really important trend in the industry, as we talked about 257 00:20:32,060 --> 00:20:33,000 Kevin Mako: at the beginning of the show. 258 00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:37,360 Kevin Mako: But something that makes it so powerful for hardware startups, for anyone who's listening 259 00:20:37,360 --> 00:20:41,340 Kevin Mako: today, understand that you're in that bracket as you're innovating your product or as 260 00:20:41,340 --> 00:20:46,040 Kevin Mako: your company, if you're just in the idea phase, know that there's more available now than ever 261 00:20:46,040 --> 00:20:48,600 Kevin Mako: before to get that product to market. 262 00:20:48,800 --> 00:20:52,400 Kevin Mako: And that's something that you can increasingly rely on over time. 263 00:20:52,600 --> 00:20:57,560 Kevin Mako: But now is of tremendous time, especially as we're rolling into 2024, as there's 264 00:20:57,560 --> 00:21:00,640 Kevin Mako: so much happening in the market, as there's so much redesign of so many different products, 265 00:21:00,700 --> 00:21:02,980 Kevin Mako: there's so much opportunity out there, as you mentioned it. 266 00:21:03,000 --> 00:21:09,240 Kevin Mako: that it's important as the hardware start to try and understand when the technology 267 00:21:09,240 --> 00:21:14,820 Kevin Mako: is ready for you and when you can start executing quickly on making your vision come to life. 268 00:21:15,120 --> 00:21:19,740 Kevin Mako: Before I let you go, what is the website that folks can learn more about the software? 269 00:21:20,500 --> 00:21:26,960 Tomide Adesanmi: Yeah. To learn more about circuit mind, you can visit www.comitmind.comind.io. 270 00:21:26,960 --> 00:21:31,640 Tomide Adesanmi: So C-I-R-C-U-I-T-M-I-N-D.io. 271 00:21:31,860 --> 00:21:32,980 Kevin Mako: And as always, I will. 272 00:21:33,000 --> 00:21:37,260 Kevin Mako: put the links in the show notes below so anybody who wants to just click through can go through there. 273 00:21:37,620 --> 00:21:41,900 Kevin Mako: Tomide, thanks again for all your words of wisdom today, is sharing how hardware development, 274 00:21:42,040 --> 00:21:46,780 Kevin Mako: especially for electronics product is getting easier, faster, and better in almost every way. 275 00:21:46,780 --> 00:21:51,420 Kevin Mako: And thanks for the tools of the trade that are helping make those visions become a reality 276 00:21:51,420 --> 00:21:53,160 Kevin Mako: for so many hardware startups around the world. 277 00:21:53,580 --> 00:21:58,280 Tomide Adesanmi: Thank you very much for having me, Kevin. I appreciate the work you do as well for all the 278 00:21:58,280 --> 00:22:02,560 Kevin Mako: hardware companies out there. Thank you. Appreciate it. And take care. Cheers, Kevin. 279 00:22:03,000 --> 00:22:06,600 Kevin Mako: Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Product Startup Podcast. 280 00:22:07,120 --> 00:22:12,100 Kevin Mako: If you found some value in the show, please do us a huge favor and hit the like button and subscribe. 281 00:22:12,640 --> 00:22:18,480 Kevin Mako: If you have any questions, guest suggestions, or anything else, feel free to reach out to us anytime at our email, 282 00:22:18,820 --> 00:22:26,060 Kevin Mako: podcast at macko0.com. This show is hosted by Kevin Mako, North America's leading expert on product 283 00:22:26,060 --> 00:22:32,660 Kevin Mako: development for hardware startups. And the podcast is produced by Mako Design, the original firm providing end-to-end 284 00:22:32,660 --> 00:22:37,760 Kevin Mako: consumer product development services tailored specifically to hardware startups, small manufacturers, 285 00:22:37,760 --> 00:22:43,760 Kevin Mako: and inventors. Take your product from idea to store shelves at MakoDesign.com. That's 286 00:22:43,760 --> 00:22:48,780 Kevin Mako: M-A-K-O-Design.com. Thanks for joining and see you again soon.