Product Scoping and Development

From Use Case to Product Definition

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1. Defining a Robotics Business

Robotics innovation has been taking place for decades, starting in research labs funded by government grants from organizations like the Department of Defense and National Science Foundation. Beyond government priorities, typically it was technology looking for useful applications and finding limited success. As an example, general purpose robots were an early dream that was not able to find commercial success. Over the past 10-20 years, the most successful robotics companies have taken a use case-focused approach to product scoping and development, which has finally positioned robotics for mass adoption across many markets.

The starting point from the previous chapter: 

Big market identified ✔️
High value use case identified ✔️
Clear industry pain point(s) found ✔️
Clear, well-articulated, problem statement(s) within a use case ✔️
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General Advice for robotics product scoping and development:

  • Conduct extensive customer interviews (30+) to sharpen and validate the problem statement.
  • Take a systems approach to early product definition.
  • Go beyond the Three Ds (Dull, Dirty, Dangerous) to provide comprehensive solutions rather than just replacing human functions.
  • Product definition is a non-linear process. Expect to iterate between problem statements, system solution goals, detailed product definition, and customer insights.
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Traditionally, robotics focused on solving the “Three Ds” (Dull, Dirty, and Dangerous tasks)

  • Dull – Highly repetitive, why should a human do it?
  • Dirty – Messy, working with toxic materials
  • Dangerous – Life threatening

This is not the wrong focus, but typically not enough to drive adoption. To really deliver the necessary ROI and an overwhelming value proposition, robotics companies need to go beyond the Three Ds.

Going Beyond the Three Ds

Tackle dull, dirty, dangerous tasks and also…
Decrease time consuming tasks
Decrease labor intensive tasks
Improve speed of service and execution
Improve safety
Improve accuracy and precision
Add traceability and built-in quality monitoring
Improve productivity/endurance, human augmentation
Physical world data collection and analytics
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2. Product Scoping

There are three key aspects for robotics product scoping:

  • Product Definition
  • Level of Autonomy
  • System Differentiation vs. Component Differentiation

A. Product Definition

Key Product Scoping Considerations
Core Product:

  • Hardware vs. software: Determine the balance between hardware, software, and their integration.
  • Beyond core robotics operation, explore software valued-added features such as data analytics, monitoring, and automation management platforms.
  • Human involvement: Decide if human involvement is necessary and at what level.
  • Disruption and workflow: Assess if the solution disrupts existing workflows within targeted industries.

Special Infrastructure:

  • Consider the need for additional infrastructure (e.g. charging stations, WiFi and Cellular Connectivity).
  • Can the product operate independently or will it need to connect to existing customer software or facility infrastructure.
  • Evaluate the solution’s potential impact on the environment and if there is infrastructure in place to mitigate this impact.

Field Support:

  • How will you maintain and support the products in the field? How to minimize onsite support over time. Will you include data logging? remote debug and repair capabilities, teleoperation assessment and recovery capabilities?

User Experience (UX) and Human-Centered Design:

  • Consider human-robot interaction, intuitive interfaces, ease of use, and ease of integration.

Regulatory Compliance and Safety:

  • Give priority to safety features and ensure compliance with relevant guidelines specific to the type of robotic solutions, specific market and application standards, and the unique regulatory requirements of different geographic regions.
  • In healthcare and life sciences, it is common practice to utilize regulatory consultants.
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The level of autonomy is a particularly critical part of product scoping with several key considerations.

Level of Autonomy
Teleoperated Semi-autonomous Fully Autonomous
  • The solution needs a human to teleoperate it remotely
  • There could still be some level of intelligence to avoid human errors
  • Reliable connectivity and telecom infrastructure are crucial
  • Needed in high complexity and high variability use cases
  • The business case depends on the cost of a human in the same environment vs. remotely isolated, i.e. underground mining operations or outer space, requiring highly trained and specialized professionals
  • The solution is designed to complete certain task(s) autonomously but still needs a human to complete other tasks, i.e. AMRs can navigate but they don’t pick/place items (yet)
  • Typically designed and deployed in environments where human co-work
  • Probably the highest in terms of cost/benefit and RoI
  • Might require some changes in the existing workflows
  • The solution is designed to work completely independent of humans within the targeted use case
  • Requires advanced AI algorithms to handle edge cases
  • Requires advanced mechanical and electronics solutions to change the physical environment
  • The business case is increasingly attractive as there is a need for very smart machines to handle complex, dangerous and/or variable use cases, i.e. outer space, nuclear crisis
Examples:

  • Teleoperated construction equipment or cars
  • Teleoperated surgical robot
 Examples:

  • Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) such as used in warehouses
 Examples:

  • Lights-out warehouse or manufacturing facility running 24/7
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B. System Differentiation vs Component Differentiation

Taking the system differentiation path: One of the best reasons to launch a robotics startup today is the abundance of great off-the-shelf components. New robotics companies should heavily use off-the-shelf hardware, especially to get to the first prototype and first products, and focus their differentiation on the system level. Don’t reinvent the wheel unless you absolutely have to.

Benefits: Speeds up development, reduces capital requirements, focuses differentiation of the whole solution, and can reduce design iteration cycles

Taking the hardware component or subsystem differentiation path: Choosing to build custom hardware must bring measurable advantages. Companies going this route at the early stages must develop a novel, definitively better component or subsystem to justify the time and capital expenses.

When to build customized hardware:

  • When there is an opportunity to solve previously impossible problems; if it makes the solution even harder to replicate if done right; when customization creates the flexibility to sell hardware for different applications.

and/or

  • For vertical integration and lowest cost: This can become an important consideration when startups reach growth stage scale and eliminating margin stacks in the bill of materials (BoM) can have high impact on gross margins.

Software Components and Software Platform: Similar to hardware, leverage off-the-shelf core software building blocks, leverage the latest AI tools for embedded physical AI and generative AI tools, and dedicate the majority of your R&D to software that delivers high value differentiation. Follow all the best practices for software development.

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C. Focusing on Sustainable Long-Term Advantages

  • The foundation typically begins with technical expertise, deep understanding of use cases, industry insights, experience, and customer connections—often including some or all of these elements.
    • Some additional defensibility criteria include:
      • Patents, proprietary methods and technology, trade secrets
      • Access to unique data sets
      • Quick and efficient prototyping and manufacturing
  • Factually assess how proprietary or groundbreaking is the solution you plan to develop and is it protectable?
  • Solution evolution over time—many successful robotics companies initially gain market traction and secure market share through hardware, then expand by developing a software business that builds upon that established, loyal customer base. A strong product roadmap can be the key for long term differentiation
  • Target additional revenue streams linked to additional differentiation based on enhanced software capabilities, data, analytics, maintenance, replacement parts and/or consumables
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3. Product Development

a. Key considerations for Robotics product development

  • Development execution in house vs outsourced for hardware and software is an individual startup CEO/CTO choice. However, in most situations, don’t outsource system architecture and design.
  • Get development teams onsite with customers. Hold off hiring dedicated field engineers so development teams experience their designs in the field.
  • Subsystem manufacturing can be outsourced but retain final system integration and testing in-house. Critical for development team learning, have the ability to iterate fast, and keep control over product quality prior to shipment to customers.
  • If feasible, when customer PoC activities ramp up, try to have a second robot in the lab so R&D and product fixes can progress in parallel to onsite customer projects.
  • Seek outside partners when the required capabilities are outside the core competence of the team.
  • Iterate and refine as quickly as possible with customers in the loop, but avoid developing a highly customized solution for a specific customer or a small group of customers.
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b. Designing for Cost Management

Getting the cost right for robotic products is equally as important as the product features and performance

Strategic selection of components:

  • Analyze costs from the beginning. Challenge every element of cost in the Bill of Materials
  • Analyze costs at every stage. Have a cost down roadmap that can be refined and executed over time. Have a clear cost target for prototype, for initial production, for manufacturing optimized, and for manufacturing at scale
  • Design with the minimal number of components and minimum complexity
  • For fast prototyping, use readily available off-the-shelf components to get an initial working prototype as efficiently as possible
  • Explore not only the popular suppliers, but the uncommon, advantageous ones
  • Choose wisely and seek experts’ input as changes may be hard later without proper planning
  • Design for manufacturability (DFM) – Manufacturing time, build complexity and testing complexity, can all be significant cost elements if not carefully considered at the design stage

Supply chain and manufacturing considerations:

  • Explore strategic suppliers and partners early on
  • Know your suppliers: Review suppliers’ roadmaps and understand their business continuity
  • Have backup suppliers for every BoM component in anticipation of the unexpected, i.e. tariffs, COVID, vendor execution, component issues…
  • Seek multiple axes of BoM component diversification: vendor, geography, established player vs innovative startups
  • Consider stage of product development and proximity of suppliers and manufacturers (i.e. while prototyping chose nearby suppliers), as they are correlated.
  • Focus on manufacturing cycle times, focus on supply chain cycle times. At growth stage, shortest cycle times and lowest manufacturing costs can be a significant competitive differentiator
  • Factor in potential for delays into your cycle time assumptions for component and subsystem orders
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Product Definition
Product Scoping
Product Development