Is InstaPart (from SnapEDA?) as big an idea as they claim it to be?

[johnkeates]

So I spotted https://www.snapeda.com/instapart/ on HackerNews, aside from the "proprietary patent-pending technology" wank, the story sounds good. The idea is that they have a library of digital models (for PCB footprints, schematic components and 3D models) you can use with a bunch of tools (they say: EAGLE, Altium, KiCad, Cadence OrCad/Allegro (Beta), & Mentor PADS), and as long as they already made the model, it's free, but if it's not made yet, you can pay them to make one in 24h for 29 USD (which is probably their business model and why they can do the rest of the library for free).

Now, I'm by no means a big EDA user, but I was wondering is this digital model thing is really something you run in to a lot when designing a schematic, PCB or 3D model of your product. It seems to me that most of that stuff is already in your EDA/CAD/CAM/Whatever package, and since it's almost purely about the visual aspect (it's not like they make circuit emulator models), does it really bother people to a level that they are going to go to a paid service to have their digital models made? And what about component vendors, don't they make the models themselves already? I get that having a huge library you can access for free is a nice thing to have, but the 'pay us to get your model in a day' model seems so strange to me...

Anyone here designing so many obscure things that this thing would be a huge improvement? Or would most people just stick something in there that looks like the part you are actually placing and just relying on the dimensions and pins to match with what you really want to put there.

[ataradov]

This is a good way to get paid while you are building a library of components that are actually in demand. At the end of the day they will own copyright, so after some time, they could charge for the whole thing. Many businessed do bootstrapping like this.

[johnkeates]

This is a good way to get paid while you are building a library of components that are actually in demand. At the end of the day they will own copyright, so after some time, they could charge for the whole thing. Many businessed do bootstrapping like this.

That makes sense, as a bootstrapping method for a library, mass usage + paid expansion is a very efficient method (if people actually have stuff built/designed on request) to get relevant content in to project like that. Maybe they'll setup a free version + paid 'extra large' version split in the future to keep the usage high (for feedback and to measure whats popular) but still make money off of the data.

[Mechatrommer]

($79 for 3D)

ok, i offer service $40 for 3D. no business bootstrap bullsheet. anyone after that will pay $5 of which 5% will goto original requester, MLM model sounds good?

[aandrew]

How is this any different from PCB Library Expert? They have a part-on-demand service that is *way* cheaper than this as well.

[stmdude]

It seems ELECENG86 is on some sort of marketing run for SamacSys..  Only two posts, both about SamacSys.