Elance for hardware: yay or nay?

3 points by OscarPedroso 11 years ago | 4 comments

Hi there,

Just doing a little bit of customer discovery for a site I'd like to launch based on some feedback I received for a previous idea. (which wasn't so hot.)

Basically, hardware and software developers would join forces to work on specific hardware projects. (Say John Smith posts a project to have two arudinos communicate using WiFi Direct and he is seeking help on the wifi part while he focuses on the motor controller stuff. He is willing to pay $350 to have someone work with him in parallel and speed up the project.)

Does this resonate with anyone out there?

Thanks!

ashleyreddy 11 years ago |

I actually have used Elance for hardware,like Arduino programming and circuit board layout. Your idea sounds a bit more collaborative. I would like to see this but expanded to prototyping machined and 3d printed parts as well. The cost to go from idea to design to part is expensive, but I think it could be a lot cheaper.

OscarPedroso 11 years ago | |

Thanks Ashleyreddy. Prototyping and 3D printed parts are exactly where we want to go with the idea. When you used Elance, were you the person posting the project? What was the iterative process like?

DigitalSea 11 years ago |

You can outsource hardware development, prototyping and anything else involving hardware on Elance and even other sites like Freelancer.com already. Unless you can compete on price, I think you will struggle to compete with the bigger players in the outsource/freelancing market.

psgbg 11 years ago |

It's interesting. But unfortunately I don't have experience for that kind of stuff.

But I think that some things would be interesting. A version control for PCBs, designs, and that kid of stuff in sync with code. Also list of components, estimates of costs of production (for every revision).