IndOps: Integrating and Automating Hardware Development

Venture news over the past few years is littered with examples of hardware companies with incredible visions – from futuristic transportation solutions to medical testing devices – that ultimately failed to turn their ideas into reality. The unique challenges of hardware solutions, including longer development timelines and higher burn rates, coupled with the usual difficulties of entrepreneurship act as a significant disincentive to founders in the space. However, I continue to be bullish on the future of physical technology and believe that many of the best solutions in the next decade will be built on the foundations of improved hardware. But to achieve this vision, the hardware development lifecycle must be improved.

Hardware developers are frequently stymied by tools that lack modern UI and purpose-built features around communication and automation. On the other hand, since the inception of new methodologies such as Agile and DevOps that aimed to optimize the development lifecycle, software engineers have benefitted from improved collaboration, automation, and visibility tools. As DevOps continues to evolve, new ideologies have formed to focus on security (DevSecOps), cost optimization (FinOps), or Git and Kubernetes management (GitOps). We propose the addition of a new paradigm: IndOps, providing industrial engineers and hardware developers who are building physical products with the same access and automation capabilities as traditional software developer tools.

Who needs IndOps?

Although the hardware engineers themselves are often the initial beneficiaries of many of these tools, we see ripple effects for teams in other departments as well, similar to visibility tools adopted through DevOps methodologies. Product managers, procurement professionals, quality assurance and compliance staff all benefit from increased access to information as products move throughout the development lifecycle, and finance and marketing teams benefit from increased accuracy on budget and launch timelines. Performance analytics and reporting metrics produced from the automation tools during development can also help guide C-suite-level strategic and operational decisions. Overall, the adoption of IndOps practices can support a broad range of stakeholders at hardware companies as they aim to iterate and launch faster and cheaper.

How does IndOps fit into the development lifecycle?

IndOps practices can be incorporated throughout the entire hardware development lifecycle, from the first step of outlining requirements to designing and building the product to managing the solution post-sale. The key steps in hardware development and the opportunities to adopt IndOps solutions include:

Architecture and Requirements: The first step of the hardware production journey is defining the requirements needed for the components and outlining the required architecture. This includes laying out any internal specifications, as well as incorporating industry standards around design or quality management systems. Guidelines around safety, maintenance, and key performance metrics are typically included at this stage. As the cost of adding additional features increases further into the process, it is vital for teams to have a clear grasp of all the requirements upfront such that they are then able to begin the design phase. Newer systems such as Enviate (a Schematic portfolio company) aim to reimagine the requirements management experience through AI-driven knowledge capture, authoring, and deep integration with operational guidelines.

Design and Analysis: Key deliverables from the hardware design process include component schematics – which represent interactions across the subcomponents, such as the electrical design of a circuit board – and BOMs (bill of materials). Cost analysis is also typically run at this point, and initial prototypes are developed. External design agencies and consultancies are sometimes brought in at this point, and costs for hardware design can rack up into the tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on the specific industry and level of technical complexity for the project. Depending on the product and internal requirements, engineers may leverage principles such as ‘designing for manufacturing’ (DfM) or ‘designing for cost’ (DfC), where they optimize components of the product based on assembly or material constraints. Recent developer tools are increasingly incorporating AI to provide high-level designs based on internal requirements and industry standards to minimize developer time and expense on this step.

Procurement: Once the required materials and components have been outlined, the BOMs are typically shared with procurement professionals who are responsible for sourcing all of the parts. This can include physical materials (refined metals or thermoplastic), equipment (a secure laptop or 3D printer), and software (collaboration tools or automated testing solutions). Supplier discovery, vetting, and coordination are vital aspects of this part of the process to make sure teams receive high-quality materials on time and within budget. Depending on the number of items needed for each component, procurement staff may negotiate volumetric discounts and more flexible payment options with suppliers. New software solutions are competing with legacy systems such as Coupa by improving supplier discovery, pricing negotiation, and the vendor onboarding process at this stage.

Product Development and Lifecycle Management (PDM / PLM): In conjunction with developing the assets themselves, the teams must also leverage tools to manage the assets as they progress throughout their usage lifecycle. Determining the required maintenance schedule, planned upgrades, and disposal plan are all part of this phase. Developer tools at this stage emphasize visibility and communication across teams and must effectively manage a wide variety of input data.

Build: One of the most exciting parts of the development process is undoubtedly building and iterating on the system itself. Some of the key components of the hardware product include firmware (a software program that controls the hardware) and middleware (software that enables all of the various programs to communicate within the device). During this part of the process, engineers may use tools such as logic analyzers from Salae or a JTAG debugging system from Lauterbach to support coding and debugging for circuit design. Newer companies are finding ways to simplify the manual programming process through training bespoke AI models and integrating directly with developer environments.

Test: A vital part of the development process is running tests, typically managed by the teams and manufacturers (often contract manufacturers that are sent the test guidelines from the teams and return performance results). Early prototypes are first developed, usually in small, controlled batches, to ensure that all of the required components are included and design expectations are met. There are three primary phases of testing that all hardware systems must go through before launch: EVT (engineering validation tests), DVT (design validation tests), and PVT (production validation tests). With each stage, the severity and cost of tests increases as more units are managed and companies work towards achieving necessary safety and testing certifications before determining that products are ready for production-scale launch. If there are any major issues detected at any of these stages, the product can go back to the drawing board – sometimes resulting in re-designs and repeated tests – which dramatically scales cost (up to millions of dollars in some instances). Next-gen solutions are automating test creation and data management, as well as providing visibility to both internal and external key stakeholders.

Production and Connectivity: Once the product has received all of the necessary certifications and sign-offs through the design and testing process, production begins. Many companies use overseas contract manufacturers to produce their items at scale or build facilities to leverage unique manufacturing talents as a differentiating edge. Procurement teams are responsible for ensuring that manufacturers have all the necessary components, and logistics teams ensure that the product reaches distribution channels on time. Design and engineering teams remain involved in ensuring product competitiveness in terms of performance and ideating on ways to lower costs while maintaining design specifications. Modern manufacturing solutions have seen significant investment over the last few years (see here for a great overview of the space) and we are excited about tools that provide rapid access to pricing and parts for the development teams themselves.

Field Service Management (FSM) / Service Lifecycle Management (SLM): Once the product has been sold, teams must ensure continued performance and plan for any required maintenance and repair, upgrades, or general upkeep timelines. Depending on the product and industry, some companies offer maintenance services (often as part of limited-time product warranties), partner with third-party providers, or offer DIY solutions for users to leverage themselves. Although more common in consumer goods, planned obsolescence after a specific period encourages repeat purchases by limiting access to repair solutions or replacement parts. Solutions at this stage, including scaled companies like ServiceMax and ServiceTitan, focus on ensuring that customers achieve satisfaction with the products themselves and provide visibility for any repair, maintenance, and upgrades needed throughout the remainder of the product’s lifecycle.

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The process outlined above is constantly plagued by delays and can run up total costs of millions of dollars. The goal of IndOps is to provide more visibility, collaboration, and automation throughout the entire process such that teams can meet development goals within budget. Today, many hardware development teams use highly manual communication channels (slides, emails, and calls) and are actively seeking new solutions that will improve their workflows.

What IndOps tools exist today?

The below market map highlights some of the tools that exist today to optimize various aspects of the hardware development process. This list includes companies across a broad range of stages, from early-stage startups to some of the largest incumbent players, and many of them provide solutions that fit across multiple stages of the development lifecycle. If you are building solutions across any of these spaces, noticed any companies I missed, or are equally as excited about this space, please reach out – I’d love to chat! My email is [email protected].

Where do opportunities still exist for solutions in this space?

In the future, we foresee more automation and visibility for developers building hardware products. Particularly as the adoption of AI picks up for mechanical and electrical engineers, we expect growth in application-specific tools, such as those offering digital requirements for aerospace and defense or design automation solutions specifically for PCBs. Just as DevOps has expanded to include other categories, we foresee future tools building for IndSecOps (building inherent security and compliance features into the hardware product) or IndFinOps (managing product costs more efficiently throughout the development lifecycle). We predict that these tools will also expand into non-technical teams, such as collaboration tools for product managers or analytics solutions specifically for operations leadership.

Given many of the successful go-to-market strategies for software developer tools, we expect to see growth in hardware developer ecosystems as well. Developer advocates and online communities built on Slack and Discord will also likely pick up as engineers become more willing to share best practices and such automation becomes industry standard, rather than a differentiating edge for teams. Many of the most popular software DevOps solutions are built on open-source software (OSS) so leveraging hardware developer communities to create industry best practices, such as standardized requirement specifications or test plans and practices across industries, and hardware open-source systems could be the next phase.

We hope that the adoption of shared best practices and an increased emphasis on building and funding developer tools to improve the hardware lifecycle will continue to drive innovation in the space. IndOps is a direct reflection of the need to support industrial engineers as they build the next rocketship, both literally and figuratively.

Everyone knows ‘hardware is hard’ – help us build the future of easyware.