Eureka Moments

[adrianh]

Isn't it amazing when you read lots and lots and lots of stuff and something strikes you as rather interesting. This interesting thought rolls around a bit in your head and you eventually fall sleep at 3am. You wake up at 8am and after an hour or so an entire plan starts to crystalize in your head. The plan is made up of wholly seemingly unrelated topics but all those topics come together into a unified plan that makes absolute perfect sense.

If I could wave a magic wand and create a IT company overnight that knows its way around a number of not particularly complex technologies I could make an absolute fortune overnight and for a long time to come.

It's not often that I am gobsmacked at my own ideas but this must be the best one to date in one of the biggest yet untapped markets in the world....all I can say is Fooooook Me....how to put this idea into practice...

It is not something that I can do myself, it needs clever IT, legal, accounting, marketing and advertising people. It is one of those things where I can see the entire picture in my head, it would take all of 5 minutes to describe and that description will enable the company to make a furtune. I don't want to run the business or be a part of it per se, I just want to profit from the idea.

hmmmm....what to do....

[Justloadit]

Hi Adrian,

This is great, I have had dreams of complete factories, almost like a mega factory movie, where you can see the material coming in, and at each step of the manufacturing process, you can see the product unfolding, along with the creative ideas to overcome the obstacles in manufacturing some of the difficult components, right to the point where you see the product coming out at the other end.

I have also had many of these, and believe me, I have been so confident that I was going to make some thing out of it, and in the majority of cases I have not been financially successful.

What may seem the sliced bread solution in your head may not quite be what the planet actually wants. One such Idea has been my solar security light, scroll to the end of the page to see it, which in my mind was the perfect product for some one unemployed to go and sell and install, dealer price R1550.00 VAT included.
You do not need to be a qualified electrician to install.
The installation process requires minimum of tools, battery drill, 10mm spanner and a flat screwdriver and a step ladder.
The installation process takes about 20 minutes
...and you could make R500 profit on each unit.

To date, I have managed to sell about 5 units, the other 10 was given as samples to companies, and potential clients.

One of the main problems with the "Eureka" moments, is that we see the world in a different light.

It requires market research, and a good marketing team, accompanied by lots of money and time.

People like you and me, have more ideas than there is time and money to market them, so invariably they are going to be difficult to find partners.

Another idea I have had, has taken 7 years to the point where I am now making a sample run of about a 1000 units for the European market. I have made countless prototypes, and spent countless hours modifying the product, you can view them here SubTronic 1-Phase. To have reached this point, both myself and my client have spent a considerable amount of money to bring it to the point where it can be marketed. As you can imagine, for the client to have spent this kind of money, and probably spent 4 to 5 times what I invested, means that ultimately they own the product, and in the end, hopefully I will make mine in the manufacture and supply of the insides. I have streamlined the manufacturing process to the point where I am very competitive.

The secret is to find a willing partner who has the money and a market to sell into, and who will not do you in.

[adrianh]

With regards to your solar security light;

A family member of mine and his business partner are making a crap load of money out of led lighting and also solar lighting. They are both extremely well connected and influential people. I honestly think that the solar security light is brilliant. I don't know whether they have one that they are already selling but I am going to forward information regarding the light to them. They have a viable market for that unit.

Is that light manufactured and or assembled locally?
Can the solar controller be used to drive other devices - could you charge say a USB Android tablet?


I don't know enough about motor control to know whether your controller is any good.

I think that we both suffer from the same problem, we are bright technical people but terrible marketers.

I have some interesting ideas about LED lighting that one could develop into viable products. Again, it is a matter of combining unrelated technologies.

Tell me more about yourself, I see that you are an electronics engineer, are you into developing other products than those two?

[Justloadit]

Hi Adrian,

The unit was designed by me, and yes I do manufacture locally, even down to the security light insides. I simply purchase the housing from a local importer, and substitute my components. There is no ways that I will ever be able to manufacture the light fitting for the price I currently pay for it. I can make any size that is required by the customer.

The unit charges a 12V battery, so theoretically, you can run anything off the unit. What is important, is that you do not place your load directly ion the battery, but use the controller as your switching device. The MPPT device has an over ride switch, which will always be on, provided the battery voltage does not drop below the critical value of 11.5V, at which time it will switch off. It will only switch the load on again, once the battery gets charged to full power, before switching the load on. By doing this, it gets the most economical cycles out of the battery.

I have another unit, which is almost ready, in which you can have mains as another form of energy to power your load. It will still use the solar panel to charge the battery up, but will only switch over to mains, if the battery voltage drops to 11.5v. It will not charge from the mains, and this is deliberately done, as the whole point of the exercise is to be off grid by as much as possible, else why go to the expense of the solar charging system and battery.

I have been doing electronic design for over 30 years, and it ranges from turnkey projects down to micro controllers, plug in timers, monitors, controllers, GSM engines, controlling stepper motors, temperature, voltage current, DC to DC convertors. At the start of my career, I designed technical training equipment in light and heavy current for the schools and colleges.
I have a small manufacturing plant down to a pick and place machine for surface mount components.