Many companies developing new products come to China expecting ‘China speed product development.’ They have heard how Chinese electronics brands can launch wearables, smart devices, and other consumer electronics products at an impressive speed, maybe even within weeks.
Understandably, they also want to launch as quickly, but China manufacturing speed is often misunderstood, so let’s look into how it works…
China Speed Product Development Is Possible, But Only When the Conditions Are Right
China can move fast when a project has the right foundations: a strong local ecosystem, proven suppliers, experienced engineering teams, fast decision-making, and enough budget to run several workstreams in parallel.
In other words, China manufacturing speed does not usually come from cutting corners. It comes from preparation, resources, scale, and access to a mature electronics supply chain. It also comes from conscious decisions to develop a product with features that are nearly “pre-developed”, as we explain below.
If the Big Chinese Electronics Brands Can Do It, Why Not Us?
The large and well-known Chinese electronics brands are actually spending huge sums on fast product development.
Large Chinese electronics companies are not developing innovative products on small budgets. Huawei reported that “in 2024, Huawei invested CNY179.7 billion back into R&D, which accounted for 20.8% of its annual revenue.”
Xiaomi’s 2024 annual report also shows the scale involved: “our R&D expenses increased by 25.9% year-over-year to RMB24.1 billion.” The same report states that Xiaomi had “21,190 research and development personnel” as of December 31, 2024.
That level of electronics R&D investment helps explain how major Chinese brands can move so quickly. They can put large, well-equipped teams on industrial & mechanical design, electronics, firmware, testing, tooling, supplier development, compliance, and manufacturing readiness simultaneously.
A smaller company with a limited product development budget usually cannot work in the same way.
“Off The Shelf” Can Speed Up Development
There is another important point. Many fast-moving products are not developed completely from scratch. They are often built on existing platforms, chipsets, supplier modules, software ecosystems, development kits, and reference designs.
We are not talking about reference designs purchased from DigiKey or Texas Instruments. Those are helpful for R&D teams, but they are not the solution for launching a product at scale.
We are talking about all the “publicly available boards” developed by companies in Shenzhen and Dongguan. They can be customized (to a certain extent), and the R&D company that developed it makes its money when it does customizations and sells at high volumes.
Those boards accelerate consumer electronics development in China dramatically. That’s why dozens (hundreds?) of suppliers showcase TWS earbuds, power banks, or massage guns with essentially the same features. 90% of those products may have the same 3-5 PCBA boards.
Custom Development Is a Different Ballgame
Many companies that bring innovative products to market need something different, and we often work with companies like these. They usually want custom electronics development and exclusive firmware, full file and tooling ownership, and clear control over the IP.
That is a valid approach, especially when developing your unique product idea (as opposed to a white-label product, for example). And it takes longer and costs more than adapting a ready-made platform or one that can be tweaked to meet your needs. (See what the process of developing a product from scratch involves).
If the product is genuinely new, the team still needs to work through technical feasibility, all the engineering design work, component selection, DFM reviews & adjustments, functional and reliability testing, compliance work, tooling, and validations through pilot builds. Each stage affects cost, reliability, and the final production result. We have assisted customers to launch custom products relatively fast, but a real custom-designed product will always take longer.
Do you actually need a fully custom-developed product?
A fully custom-developed product can make sense, but it is not always the right first step, especially for a hardware startup. In many cases, it is safer to “stair-step” your way toward a custom product rather than jumping straight into full development.
A typical hardware stair-step path looks like this:
- Step 1: Resell an existing ODM product.
Start with a product that already exists. You do not own it, and you have limited control, but it lets you learn the market, build sales channels, and understand what users dislike or want improved. - Step 2: Improve the ODM product.
Once you have traction, work with the supplier to add 1 or 2 key features and negotiate some market exclusivity. If your order volumes matter to the supplier, they may agree to invest or collaborate. You may still need to pay for development, molds, or meet sales targets. - Step 2b: Use a pre-developed platform.
If improving the ODM product is not possible, another option is to build around an existing platform, such as a pre-developed PCB and existing enclosure mold. This is common in Shenzhen and is usually faster and cheaper than developing a product fully from scratch. - Step 3: Develop your own product.
Once you clearly understand the market, target users, and what a better product should include, invest in developing your own product with a contract manufacturer. At this stage, contracts, ownership, and IP protection become much more important. This costs more, but gives you far more control and design freedom.
A fully custom-developed product is often appropriate when you have proven market demand and traction. It gives you much more control and design freedom, but it also brings higher cost, more development risk, and a longer path to market. By stair-stepping your development, the goal is to learn enough, prove demand, and build enough commercial confidence to justify the investment.
This approach is explained in more detail in part 3 of our series: The 3 Major Hardware Killers (Part 3): Running out of Funding.
The Real Lesson: Controlled Speed
China can definitely be fast. However, “fast on an existing electronic design platform” is quite different from “fast in developing a new product from scratch”. The typical timelines differ, and the typical budgets are worlds apart.
In addition, when working with factories with unsophisticated systems, fast can mean cheap, improvised, or risky, and nobody wants that. No matter the approach, the goal should always be controlled speed: moving as quickly as realistically possible while protecting quality, reliability, IP ownership, and production readiness.
