Welcome to Product Hubb, a platform that makes it easy to manufacture any hardware product. This article will cover how to get started on Product Hubb and create your first product. We'll be building the Trezor Model T which is an open-source cryptocurrency wallet. All the files for this project are open source and available on Trezors GitHub page. These are devices that allow for the storage and encryption of digital currency.
The first step to creating a product is to add all the categories that you will need to build the final product. In this case, we will need an electronic circuit board, plastic case, packaging material, and some assembly instructions. We can start our project on the Products page by giving our project a name and selecting all the necessary categories needed. If you miss something don't worry about it. You can always come back and edit anything you missed later.
The wallet will be sold fully assembled and packaged and consists of a circuit board inside a plastic shell. So this product checks all the boxes. Note that not all products have to have all the boxes checked.
The next step is to create a component on the Electronic Components page and give it a name. This will add a card to our project that contains all the information we need to create the circuit board for the Trezor Model T Wallet. Once the card is created we will need to add all the raw components needed to make this circuit board. We can add the parts and information manually or upload a current excel or CSV file directly onto Product Hubb. Product Hubb automatically assigns new internal part numbers to every part and keeps everything organized. Your excel/csv files only need these three items to populate the table.
"Manufacturer Part Number, Quantity Per Unit, Reference Designators"
Once you have uploaded the file, you can enter the number of units you would like to make and click get quote. This will automatically search our vendor database and download all the relevant information for that part. The tables will automatically populate with the images, prices, and availability information. As of 7/13/2022, we only use Digikey but do plan on adding additional vendors in the future.
Bills of materials can be imperfect and come with the occasional outdated or unavailable components, so we’ve designed Product Hubb to help. We've built a color-coded flagging system to ensure you see what's important. Yellow means that there was an issue finding that part but the system suggested an alternate. Parts highlighted red means the system could not find that part or a replacement.
Once the items are found, the system will also compute and display some other important information. You can see unit cost, lead times, and out of stock parts all in real time. These values are updated every-time you request a quote. The system will all save this information and show you the date when they were quoted. The total price of the board will also be displayed on the main card. The system will also allow you to compute PCB and Assembly costs in the near future and save it to the card.
This section includes details about the mechanical parts in the product and the tooling used to make them. The digital currency wallet we are making is very simple. It only needs a plastic shell made of a top and bottom case. Enter the information manually or import a spreadsheet to save some time. Your excel/csv files can contain the follow items:
"Description, Manufacturer Part Number, Quantity Per Unit, Unit Price, Note, Link"
Unlike the electronics component, there is no database that exists to get all the hardware items needed to build this product. Instead, pricing are loaded/supplied by your vendors. You can also include images and tier pricing manually to each part. Once you have all your parts loaded, you can enter a build quantity, and update cost automatically based on the number of units you plan to build. This will automatically select the correct tier pricing.
This section also contains a separate tooling section. Here you can add and manage your hardware tooling (Injection Molds, Stamping, Etc). To access this, click or tap on Add/View Tooling to create the metal molds used in production. Create a tool with the same part number as a mechanical item to link them together. Here we can make tools to make the top and bottom of the wallet's plastic casing. You can also upload a 3D files, and add details like material, color, texture, and tooling cost. This will also allow you to share the files and part details with your vendors for quote with just one click.
After electronic and mechanical components are added, we can move on to the packaging and accessories associated with our crypto wallet project. Many aspects of packaging are custom-made to fit the exact measurements of a product. Those pieces and their information can be manually added, or they can be uploaded directly from an existing spreadsheet. We can include images, design files (PDF's), vendor details, and tiered pricing. Your excel/csv files can contain the follow items:
"Description, Manufacturer Part Number, Quantity Per Unit, Unit Price, Note"
In this example we added the cardboard box packaging, a USB cable, and a physical cryptocurrency wallet recovery card, which will be bundled with the final product.
Once we have the parts, it's time to put them together. Product Hubb lets creators add as many assembly steps as a project needs and label and order them. Create complete instructions for others to read and implement. Include the assembly cost based on conversations with a manufacturing team. Product Hubb offers standardized categories when creating assembly instructions. Once all the steps are complete, you can easily share with your builder at any time. This will insure your product is built exactly to your specifications.
On Product Hubb, you can add details about vendors providing each of the parts necessary to make your product.
Whether it’s a parts sourcing company, a full-service product company, or an online parts store, you can add details like company name, email address, phone number, website, address, terms, and account numbers.
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Click or tap on your profile picture to bring up your profile menu. Select Vendors. From there, you can add vendors individually, one at a time, or upload your vendor list as an Excel or .CSV file.
With vendor and parts information inputted, you can make orders right to your business’s doorstep.
Now that you have all of the necessary information input into the different Product Hubb tabs, we can make all of the essential parts orders from your vendors and manufacturers.
From one place, you can buy components from all of your vendors and get them delivered directly to your business or assembly site.
At the top of the screen, click or tap on orders.
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Select “Add new PO” to place an order. The order menu allows for a customizable purchase. You’re able to order based on specific bills of materials or based on specific products. You can make orders for only the parts your assembly site is short on and choose specific parts by part number
After that, choose a shipping option and input a shipping address (if it differs from the billing address).
Once you’re ready, select “Generate Purchase Order.” The cost is calculated, and you receive an invoice for the order placed. The requests are then sent to your vendors for processing and shipment.
The Inventory tab lets us build up from a single screw to a completed product ready to be shipped. No messy webs of excel formulas or expensive inventory software is needed. It's all built in!
Let’s dive into the inventory with the Trezor Model T wallet. We can order parts individually by part number on the component tab. For example, we can add/remove 1000 units of an individual piece of the PCB under the items tab. This is useful when cleaning up your inventory but the true power comes from managing complete BOM's.
Under the components tab, you can add and remove complete BOM's as well as create sub assemblies. As you add and create sub assemblies, your raw materials are automatically consumed. You can also see estimates of how many sub-assembles you can make at any given time based on your inventory. The platform also allows us to create final products based on how many of the necessary components we have. Inventory changes would reflect toward the bottom of the page. After making producing the wallets, our inventory would update and display.
On the same page, we can also mark fully assembled products as sold and remove them from inventory. The platform updates to inform us exactly how many parts and components we have ready to be turned into something greater. At any point in a product's life, we can purchase or remove additional components to keep inventory accurate. Creators can now easily monitor how much of their stock is unassembled, partially assembled, or fully assembled and ready to ship.
Most companies do not rely on a single SKU and use the same components across multiple projects for more efficient and cost-effective manufacturing. Shared Inventory allows us to seamlessly use any parts we've ordered for any products or product lines.
With the project created, assembly instructions sent, and inventory updated, we can see everything we've done on the dashboard.
Go to the Dashboard and select a product from the menu on the left-hand side. We can select anything we are working on, in this case, a crypto wallet. Here, there is access to a top-down view of assembly and inventory metrics. View stock figures, timelines based on monthly sales, unit cost, live production updates from assemblers, and remaining raw stock on one page. See sales over time to catch patterns in demand. The idea here is once the product is set up, it can be monitored from here. Manage different products or even product lines from here.
This article covered building a product from scratch on the Product Hubb platform. Manage multiple products and product lines and expand like never before. Independent creators and growing businesses have never had access to product lifecycle management software until today. Are you interested in learning more and trying out Product Hubb for yourself? Sign up for a live demo and gain beta access to the future of manufacturing.