Hardware is Hard - the story of bringing Holiday to life PAHMEL13 http://moorescloud.com

1. Hardware is Hard
A story about bringing Holiday, intelligent
connected lighting, to life…
Kate Carruthers
Oct 2013

2. Products are hard
Even with the resources of a big
organisation behind a new
product, it’s still hard

3. Startups are hard too
Source: Entrepreneur Weekly, Small Business Development Center, Bradley Univ, University of Tennessee Research
http://www.statisticbrain.com/startup-failure-by-industry/

4. Year 1
25%
fail
“Knowledge is a terrible burden.
It may help you, but it might also
destroy you.”
- James Patterson
Year 2
36%
fail
Year 3
44%
fail

5. Hardware
Team
• More moving parts
• Needs diverse skills
• Requires longer lead times
Dan
Lynch
Kean
Maizels
Mark
Pesce
Kate
Carruthers
Robert
Tiller
Paul
Bridgestock

6. Formed September 2012, Incorporated February 2013
‘Internet-of-Things’ hardware, apps and services
Initial design, ‘Light’, received huge response in press

7. Research revealed product design with a much
stronger consumer response
March 2013 refocus to bring new product to
market
Holiday lighting $10B/year global market
MooresCloud seeks to capture 1% of market within
5 years
Design concept - February 2013

9. The devil is
in the
details…

11. World’s first programmable, interactive LED fairy lights
50 Independently-addressable LEDs,16M colours, 7m
string
Embedded LINUX computer, WiFi & Internet
Endless variations of colour, pattern and animation
Controlled by buttons, smartphone, tablet, PC or
Internet
Unique Web-based interface works across all devices

12. HOLIDAY
Manufacturing prototype - May 2013

13. HOLIDAY
Web Apps - Sept 2013

15. Published 22 September
Orders doubled overnight!
Many buyers in US & EU
Articles in other
magazines forthcoming.

17. The first 3rd-party app developers for Holiday by
MooresCloud, Hobart s Secret Lab have written a
app for iOS that transforms any song in an iTunes
library into a festival of light and colour and
animation!
MooresCloud has worked closely with Secret Lab to
make their app beautiful, responsive and absolutely
engaging, the first of many apps we will create in
partnership with developers.

18. Products happen at
the intersection of
culture, team, and
creativity

19. Design is key and is
enabled by critical
conversations

20. Parallel streams
Front end development
Industrial design
Back end development
Hardware design
Software engineering
Hardware engineering
Operations
management
Manufacturing
Sales
Legal and compliance
Marketing
Certification
Testing
Logistics

21. Key Ingredients
Solid team
Mission clarity
Everyone contributes – no
freeloaders
Skilled and well-aligned
partners
Source: http://www.mediamum.net

22. Key Ingredients
Focus:
Business goals
Customer needs
Role clarity
Scope exclusions
Quality standards
Shipping product
Source: http://www.mediamum.net

23. Kate Carruthers
info@moorescloud.com
http://moorescloud.com
@MooresCloud