Toying with an idea of starting a controller business

[Jyge]

The thing is - I bought Simped pedals some 20 years ago. Still using them, great value for the money. At that time it was a one man company and I guess he has already passed away.

 

 

 

I am in a process of building myself a new set, just for fun - nothing wrong with my Simpeds (although I was too cheap to buy the ones with toebrakes - ever since I built my own expansion). I am going to power it all with Pro-Micro board and reprogram it with MMJoy2

 

 

 

Now my question is - if it turned out to be a great set, what is keeping someone like me from starting an own garage start-up and offering such things for sale? I do not think the actual offer on pedals is that great (definitively mostly not something I would take over my trusty Simpeds). Other than registering a company, paying taxes and stuff like that.

 

 

 

What is the legal take on using something like a cheap Pro-Micro board and modifying the stuff with MMJoy2. Is it something where you would need to start paying somebody copyrights or something?

 

 

 

Asking just out of an academic interest...

[longuich]

There’s nothing holding you back. Check the licenses on software and hold yourself to those licenses.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Rick50]

hmm.

 

Well, making a prototype is one thing. Maybe even handbuilding two dozen, one at a time, and auctioning them on a website, similar.

 

BUT... actually producing them, to try and grow volume, that is a major undertaking, growing production is a creature all unto itself, and is quite risky. You need to really look into the market, do a SWOT analysis,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis

to make SURE you can sustain profitability, that justifies the risks of ramping up your tooling and supply chain, not to mention distribution. You might think this over the top, but even a modest home based production, can involve significant investment in equipment, which you may never actually pay off from sales.

 

From what I see, there's a great deal of rudders on the market, and not that many buyers. For every rudder pedal set, I'll bet 1000 joysticks are sold. Maybe a lot more than that. Sure, the sticks are very much different levels of quality, from a Virpil all the way down to a Saitek AV8R (which is apparently a disaster even as a FREE stick for use in arcade games... read up on the reviews of it!!). Remember, your competitors are already working through or finished their production problems, they are established with expert reviews and public name recognition, they have distribution already figured out... while you are an unknown gamble to the prospective buyer.

 

Have you thought of how you'd be different/better/cheaper than all your competition? Where in the market segment you'd fit ? (cheapest, budget but useable, pretty good, darn good, absolutely awesome for a rediculous price that few can afford, or insane cash for just decent?). If when you are still growing, at a vulnerable stage (you spent all your savings, but haven't seen that much profit yet), would you be able to survive if you suddenly see two new competitors appear from nowhere, offering something similar for less, and the other competitor offers something visibly better for about the same as your price point?

 

Basically, what I'm saying is, if you are crafting them one by one, selling them one by one, you might get a modest profit, for little overhead and little stress. But moving to production, you essentially are becoming a businessman, you need to learn about businesses that manufacture things, how they start, what are their pitfalls, what are the main things that give them grief.

 

Elon Musk is a very rich and extremely capable guy. Growing an electric car company from nothing. Growing a rocket company, again from nothing. Both businesses were nobody upstarts a decade ago, going against industry giants with decades of experience and success. In interviews people keep asking him about how he comes up with ideas and design choices, yet he has consistently stated that while making a rocket that can get to space is VERY hard... making production that can make it profitable is WAY harder than that. Same for making electric cars: hand building them, like the original roadster, difficult... but making mass production for the Model3 and the even newer cheap models, that stressed much of the company's employees right to the limit, putting in extremely stressful and very long hours every day.

 

Business can be profitable, and very much so for some people. But it's not as simple or risk-free as many think: Businesses launched only seem to have around about a 10% survival rate just three years after startup. Usually, for accounting purposes, equipment/machine purchases tend to be amortized over 5 years... that's not fun. Many people start businesses and end up declaring bankruptcy, which affects your ability to buy a house for years later, among other things.

 

BUT... it CAN work out for you. All I'm saying is: minimize your risk and maximise the chance of profitable success, by doing your homework, do all the deep dives you can, learn as much as you can. Or just hand craft them one at a time like an artisan!

 

Business license is litterally going to be the least of your costs and worries. Often in many municipalities can be done online, paying a modest fee. Licencing of the electronics, not really sure, but if you look up the legal documents for the items you plan to use, that should get you started, then maybe send some emails to the parties in question for a better idea of pricing if that's relevant.

 

Look, I'm not trying to discourage you, I'm trying to give you the best chance at success, because this gets complicated and risky. So research and plan. Maybe take some business courses at a local college nightschool or something.

[punk]

If you can keep build quality up and costs low then nothing I suppose.

 

Salute,

:punk:

[Sokol1_br]

I do not think the actual offer on pedals is that great ...[/quote

 

In Rudder Pedals the market has plenty of options.

 

Low cost < $100

Thrusmaster TFRP

 

Midi-Low cost <$100

CH PRO Pedals

Logitech PRO pedals (ex-Saitek)

 

Middle-high cost < $250

VKB T-Rudder

VirPil WarBRD

 

High cost > 250

MFG Crosswind

VirPil ACE2

Thrustmaster TPR

Slaw Viper

 

Not considering pedals optimized for helicopter or airliners, and small production in Eastern Europe countries like this model. an example, L.A.R. pedals, similar to VKB T-Rudder:

 

..(definitively mostly not something I would take over my trusty Simpeds)

 

VKB, VirPil, MFG, Slaw, TPR are ways more modern than Simped that is from end of 1990's, and although was the first pedal to use contactless sensor (Hall sensor) electronics is way outdated today, in Rise of Flight forum an guy say that is less than 8 bits (256 points of resolulion) of outdated CH pedals.

 

The mechanic center system solution of Simped, a "pincer" is good (an improved version is used in TPR), but was surpassed by CAM center system (VKB, VirPil, MFG, Slaw).

 

Then, the ideal market niche for your product is <$250, because the existente options, VKB and VPC exist more on theory than in practice.

 

MMJoy2 firmware is free for personal use, but not for comercial use. I think their developer MegaMOZG (on this forum) provide a solution based on electronics of VirPil for this case.

 

Anyway you can use FreeJoy firmware in commercial project, what use STM32 hardware, more modern relative to ATMEGA32u4 in Arduinos used by MMjoy2:

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/57900-freejoy-opensource-joystick-controller-on-stm32/?do=findComment&comment=883996