OEM · ODM
Three ways to work with us, and three different things you are buying
An edition buys a faster drop. A new shell buys a sculpt that is yours. Full custom buys the product. The money, the schedule and the risk differ in each case, and mixing them is how two sides discover in month three that they were describing different jobs. So the first conversation is about one thing only: which of the three you are actually after.
What each shape buys
Editions on a production platform
Your colourways, print set, packaging and expressions on a shell already in production and not committed exclusively to another channel. No new tooling and no electronics changes — you are buying a faster drop.
Cost: unit + finish and print set + edition packaging. Development is zero.
Testing whether the category sells through your channel at all, with one drop.
Proven electronics platform + new collectible shell tooling
The board and the firmware baseline come from something already validated; the shell and structure are tooled around your sculpt, finished to collectible standards. The outside changes, most of the inside does not.
Cost: structure design + shell tooling + finish sampling + pilot run. Electronics reused.
You need a sculpt that is genuinely yours without paying for a new board.
Full custom development
Sculpt, mechanism, board, firmware, app and server, all built around a specification you wrote. Tooling, finish development, certification and the pilot run live on this line too.
Cost: definition + sculpt + structure + electronics + firmware + tooling + pilot + certification.
The differentiation is the product, not the paint.
Six questions we need answered before quoting
These six answers decide the platform, the cost and the schedule. A quotation given before they are settled is a guess with better formatting.
- Where the character and IP stand
- Whether a character bible, a style guide and a licensed category exist decides when the expression set, the voice and the exterior can start — and how many approval gates the schedule carries.
- How far the finish has to go
- Mould texture, panel lines, pad printing, decals, metallic paint, plating, light piping — each adds tooling, fixtures and inspection cost. Point us at a figure you consider the standard and the conversation halves.
- How editions are planned
- Sprayed parts versus moulded-in colour, how many packaging versions, how batches are cut — a limited programme is costed at the BOM level, not improvised at mass production.
- Which markets it will be certified for
- CE, FCC, RoHS, toy safety (EN71, ASTM F963 where they apply). Certification decides part selection, including the battery; it is not something to add after the layout is finished.
- Target retail price and first-drop size
- The retail price implies a BOM ceiling. That ceiling decides which collectible exists at that price band — not which supplier is cheaper.
- What it does when nobody is watching
- The idle behaviour is the line between a display piece and an appliance with a screen, and it is the phase schedules forget to budget.
Five working rules
Structure and PCB designed together
The stacking, the key travel, the microphone port, the speaker cavity and the battery bay are all decided by the board outline and the component placement. The sculpt can lead, but the stacking must follow in step — otherwise round two redoes both.
No invented production claims
Production runs on partner lines in Shenzhen. We name the line before an order and will arrange a visit, so the question of who builds it is answered before money moves.
Numbers with a source
Current, temperature rise, standby, noise and colour deviation are measured, not quoted from someone else’s datasheet. If we cannot produce the report, we do not give the figure.
Ownership written into the contract
Tooling the client paid for, the character-specific expression assets and application firmware, and the certification applicant position belong to the client. The RTOS, chip vendor SDK and third-party libraries stay under their own licences.
The one job we decline
Reproducing the appearance and mechanism of a product that is already on sale. The same category is fair work; a copy is not — the line is drawn before the brief is discussed.
What we build, and what is worth reading first
- · Conversation and behaviour: cloud LLM integration, voice front and back end, wake and interruption, expression engine
- · Structure: mould texture and panel lines, pad-print and decal fixtures, transparent and light-piping parts
- · Finish: metallic, pearlescent and rubber-touch spraying, plated parts, limit samples and colour control
- · Electronics: board, power tree, standby current, EMC pre-scan
- · Software: app, server, OTA, content and accounts
Tell us which shape first — then a quote means something
A brief, a reference drawing or a physical sample all work. What usually comes back first is which shape your brief lands in and which answers are still missing — not a number.
Send the brief