What Types of Companies Make Mobile Device Mounting Products

In this article, I introduce you to types of companies that create, produce, market and sell mounting products for smartphones and tablets. Before the first iPhone appeared in 2007 and first iPad in 2010, there were no mounting products for mobile devices. Once the need for mounts appeared, various types of companies rushed in to fill the void. I have divided them into four categories, and I describe the advantages and challenges they had in meeting the demand. The categories:

1. Established Mounting Companies are already specialists in fixed and mobile mounting solutions for other products such as video cameras, laptops and instruments. Their advantage is already having the funding, engineers, manufacturing, marketing, distribution, sales in place. These companies’ challenges are; 1) to learn what customers want and; 2) to make their solutions consistent with existing standards, appearance and branding. Additionally, they usually have to commit to large production runs.
2. Established Companies of Products in Other Industries are already producing products from other fields, i.e. music instruments, phone cases and presentation products. Mobile devices enable their primary products to function better and the devices make it easier for their customers. Therefore, these companies started to make the mounts as value-added accessories and, in some cases, the mounts have become stand-alone products.
3. Start-ups Founding Based a Single Product are new companies that independent inventors establish in order to commercialize their new and better mount. Their advantage is being totally unconstrained by precedent and the owners have full decision-making power. The challenges are big and many. The inventors have to fund the whole venture and infrastructure with their own resources and those of angel investors and equity firms. However, crowdsourcing sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo became a brand new source of funding. There is no shortage of mounting ideas. For example, as of January 25, 2018, there are 132 projects for tablet stands and 80 for smartphone stands on Kickstarter.
4. Chinese Manufacturers who advertise in Alibaba and elsewhere looking for resellers worldwide wanting to order in very large quantities. One distinction I have yet to make is that manufacturers create mounts for either the consumer or business market or both. I believe that the Chinese products were more likely go to the high volume consumer market who demand low prices and are more willing to accept lower quality, e.g. plastic. Conversely, I think that the companies in 1-3 are more prepared to serve the business sector which is not as price sensitive, quality sensitive, may have tighter time requirements and often needs customization.

This listing and categories is an unofficial first shot at describing the manufacturing landscape thus it is far from authoritative and comprehensive. My review of websites selling mobile device mounting products revealed several thousand manufacturers many of which that sell only one item.