You can buy almost any product or service from the comfort of your own home from all over the world these days. Sometimes it can be very cost effective to outsource a product or service internationally. Engineering is a service that is best done locally.
Expertise
American engineering schools have some of the highest standards of engineering universities globally. Not only are they well trained, they will have a much deeper understanding of U.S. regulations that government organizations like the FDA and OSHA have in place. You could have an international firm work on your project and there are many that would have the skills to handle it, but you will be paying them extra in the time it takes to research regulations. It’s also more difficult for an engineer in another country to find out if someone has already patented or trademarked your product. If it already has patents or trademarks then your product will have to be designed around that patent so there are not infringement issues and a local engineer will be much better equipped to understand how to get around those issues.
Quick Response Times
Not having to deal with international time zones means it should only take hours to get answers instead of days. It can be a huge pain to have to wait until the next day for an answer to a simple question. With long projects you’ll want to reduce response times to speed up your project.
Quicker Development Times
Because local engineers are generally more familiar with the rules and regulations your product will have to follow, they won’t have to spend as much time researching your product, which means that the development time will be shorter. Also, because local engineers generally have a higher level of expertise, they will be able to work more efficiently than ones you may find from other countries.
Since local engineers will be in a much closer time zone to you, questions will be able to be asked and answered much more rapidly. The more complex your project is, the more of a back and forth there will need to be. If you have to wait until the next day to get answers to questions because your engineer is on the other side of the world, that means the development time of your project is going to be longer than if you used a local firm.
More Cost Effective
With engineering costs, it’s not always about who has the cheapest rate per hour. An engineer that can get a project done in fewer hours but charges more per hour can be cheaper than an engineer with a lower rate per hour but takes several more hours in research or from lack of skill can end up being more expensive than using a local engineer. At Phoenix Product Development, we make sure to keep the highest level of expertise on hand while charging a fair price.