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Getting Your Idea Into the MarketplaceCopyright 2007. SunZag Creative Products. All rights reserved. Re-printed with permission from the author.
So, you are an inventor with an idea, perhaps with a prototype or two. How exactly do you go about getting your idea into the marketplace and start making money from it? There are many paths to take, and many books have been written that cover topics such as licensing your invention to a big company, or self-venturing it as an entrepreneur. Only you can decide the correct path to take. You should listen to some advice of others, but in the end, the decision is yours – after all, nobody should know your invention (and its potential market) better than you do. (more…)

Over the past few months, we published the first three parts of his four part series on his 13 Rules of Invention Success. Here is Part 4 of his 4 part series, (Copyright 2006 SunZag Creative Products. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from the author):

I made a few more prototypes and spent the next few months looking for licensees and was able to demonstrate my prototypes to the few that were interested. Licensing is difficult, most companies will not look at outside ideas. They will not be as passionate about it as you are, and are very slow and difficult to negotiate with (they want your product for free, and don’t want to pay you anything upfront). It’s like talking to an elephant to move. You are the small guy. I could write a long article sharing my struggles and experiences of licensing, but that is another story, and without pictures. Therefore I decided to manufacture it myself.
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Wade Sun the inventor of the Disc Eraser TM continues to share the lessons he learned as he went through the process of developing his invention, (Copyright 2006 SunZag Creative Products. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from the author):

“The next step: designing my product/final prototype. When you design a product, you need to weigh the factors of material cost vs. functionality vs. size vs. safety vs. appearance, among many other things. To beat out the shredders and the hand-held CD scraping devices, I wanted my device to be compact, portable, and small enough to fit inside my pocket. Smaller is better, for inventory and shipping purposes, and being compact and lightweight is a definite plus. Looking at my first prototype, I determined that I could make my final prototype even smaller without compromising the stability. For added safety, instead of a retractable blade design, I thought about making a hinged base plate that opened in similar fashion as the paper trimmer, with the CD alignment stubs on the inside surface. In terms of engineering and manufacturing, a retractable blade would complicate my product’s development as well as increase production costs.

RULE #8 KEEP YOUR DESIGNS SIMPLE. I reasoned that the blade did not protrude out much from the slider because the distance from the CD surface would be very close. Besides, with my hinged plate design, the blade would not be exposed during operation. So there would be no need for a retractable blade mechanism.

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Copyright 2006. SunZag Creative Products. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from the author. Part 3 of Wade Sun’s 4 part article on his 13 Rules of Invention Success will be posted here Next month).Wade Sun the inventor of the Disc Eraser TM continues to share the lessons he learned as he went through the process of developing his invention:

I wanted to design a prototype with a sliding fixture that would safely enclose the scarifier and permit sliding across the CD surface. I also needed a baseplate that would securely hold the CD in a precise position relative to the slider. As an inventor, the easiest and quickest way to make a prototype is to use or modify existing parts.

RULE #6 BE RESOURCEFUL: I came across a personal paper trimmer at Office Max and bought a few of them.

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Copyright 2006. SunZag Creative Products. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission from the author. Part 2 of Wade Sun’s 4 part article on his 13 Rules of Invention Success will be posted here Next week).

 Wade Sun the inventor of the Disc Eraser TM shares the lessons he learned as he went through the process of developing his invention:

“On TV, cool! But where’s my name, and my 60 seconds?
One common struggle that many inventors have is building a working prototype. Unless you are very crafty, or have access to a fabrication shop, it seems impossible to actually build a working prototype yourself. You may hire professionals or students to do it, but most of the fun and learning comes when you build your own prototype. You will also encounter and solve a lot of problems up front, which can be costly mistakes when it gets manufactured later on. I will share my journey of taking a patentable idea from my head (the intangible “invention”) and turning it into a finished prototype by testing and plastic casting at home. For many small to medium sized inventions, plastic is the preferred material in terms of functionality and durability. If you need a unique plastic part for your invention, you can probably learn to make one yourself by following my example. I discovered how to shape and form the parts that I needed by using a plastic molding kit, which is available in specialty plastics crafts shops.

I used Quik Cast,  a 2-part liquid that mixes and hardens in a couple hours and cures overnight. And TAP Silicon RTV mold compound, which you design a mold to cast your custom plastic parts in.

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Out of many thousands, Wade made it to the top 30 for the new hit Reality TV show, The American Inventor.

Wade discovered and developed a new technique and product that will revolutionize how the world disposes of unwanted or confidential CD-Rs and DVDRs.

Much simpler than a CD shredder, the Disc Eraser ^TM is safe, small in size, and affordable. It’s also the first and only Eco-Friendly disc destruction device that doesn’t create any eWaste and promotes recycling.

In this Blog entry, Wade will share with us what he had learned going through the American Inventor show and through the invention process, and how he brought his product to market.

Inventors: Read and learn….