Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1078362
46 SMT007 MAGAZINE I FEBRUARY 2019 Bay Area, how much is it going to cost me versus if I make it in Malaysia, Thailand, or Taiwan? In short, what financial resources do I need to spend on the overall cost of supplier management? I might be worried about my IP, so I would not go to certain IP risk areas for manufacturing. Companies always say there is an IP screen- ing wall, but things can go bad very quickly on the IP side. We are not big enough or re- sourceful enough to fight that right now. What we want to do right now for the next two to three years is keep it within the U.S., and then slowly migrate into countries with safe harbor where we can be careful about our IP. I don't have time to worry about my IP being safe. For initial manufacturing, anywhere in the U.S. is fine, and then have a plan for cost reduction to safe, low-cost countries. Johnson: It sounds to me like the size of the company you work with is not that important as long as they can hit your four criteria. Ramanathan: Yeah. The size of the CM doesn't matter, but their technology matters—what they have and their talent pool. Another thing is the ability to scale the capacity, which is where the size comes in—if somebody is large enough to throw in $10 million into a first fac- tory to launch and not worry about getting money from me is a huge advantage. I don't want to be in a position to fund a CM to ex- pand their operation. Johnson: I'm going to ask a pretty pointed question right now if you don't mind regard- ing sales strategies. Ramanathan: No problem. Johnson: How should PCB manufacturers and assemblers sell their services to you? You rep- resent the kind of customer that my readers are looking for. Ramanathan: While a product is in prototyping, speed is very important. Most small CMs work based on advances. You pay them 50% before they even touch anything, but then they can turn it around in 10 days or less. Speed is what was driving the selection. If a salesperson from a CM comes to the engineer and offers to de- liver faster than anyone else in the market, you are in. I hate to say this, but the most common entry into an early-stage company is through their engineers because there is no operations or sourcing team. When an operations team is in place, you need to be connected with them and not avoid them. The first thing sourcing people want to know is, "How are you going to give a quality product on time that costs less than what we pay now?" They want to have an open book and a cost-plus model. That is not possible at a prototype level, and most sourcing teams would un- derstand that. It is your job as a CM to make them feel comfortable. That cost reduction will follow vol- ume and product maturity, or even better, give them ideas on where they can save money (design for cost, or DFC). The bottom line is get in the door. Sometimes, that's as simple as cold calling. Being best is not AEye claims that the AE110, using iDar a new form of perception data collection, is the most advanced product for the automotive mobility market.