Do most big companies reverse-engineer competing products ?

[MathWizard]

At companies like Intel/AMD/Nvidia/Samsung/etc, I know there's employee's that go back and forth between some companies, and corporate espionage, and probably some market rigging.

But do any of them have dedicated teams, that buy the latest chip or whatever, and then just reverse engineer it ? And are any of them open about it, like so your job title is reverse engineer ? I saw a movie about something like that once.

[madires]

I doubt any of those companies would admit reverse engineering. However, there are a few small companies specialzed in exactly this. But it's common to buy products of competitors and check their performance, also taking them apart to get more insight (quality, production costs, etc.).

[m98]

They will definitely have every competitor's product reverse engineered. Not necessarily for any nefarious reasons, how else would they detect IP infringements?
Now most probably won't have those capabilities in-house, which is why there are so many specialist companies offering that service.

[fourtytwo42]

I thought that was what treez/faringdon and other personalities of that individual thought WAS the design process 

[langwadt]

I know car companies buy competitor cars to tear them apart to figure out how they were build, down to the number of spot welds and material thickness

I'm sure other companies also do it, not only to see how the competitors do something, but also to spot patent infringement etc.

[Berni]

Oh yes all the big companies reverse engineer the heck out of the competitors products.

The cost of developing a new product is much higher than the final cost of a product to the end user (Well apart from very niche low volume custom solutions). So it makes a lot of sense to buy the competitors product just to rip it to bits and see how they did it. You might also keep one in working order just to that you can do direct comparison tests between your product and the competitions product. If your product is worse when put side by side with theirs then you want to improve your product before you start selling it.

There are even companies that offer reverse engineering as a service:
https://www.pentestpartners.com/security-blog/reverse-engineering-tesla-hardware/
https://leandesign.com/
These people will rip apart the competitors product for you. For some of the popular items like Teslas cars they actually bought a car themselves. Ripped it apart and put all the components arranged on boards for easy inspection and put together lots of reports that companies can buy. The reports contain detailed photos and diagrams of how thins go together and even cost breakdowns estimates of what each component cost to make.

[daqq]

Yes. It's common practice and nothing to be ashamed of. And it's not (necessarily) nefarious - patent/IP infringement, certification fights, penetration testing... there's any amount of reasons to do it and why it's done. Imagine how much analysis goes into something like a patent lawsuit (say: https://www.xilinx.com/news/press/2020/xilinx-files-patent-infringement-lawsuit-against-analog-devices.html ).

Simple examples:
https://www.reverse-costing.com/
https://www.reverse-costing.com/teardown-notes/apple-watch-series-6-evolution/
https://www.reverse-costing.com/media/teardowns.pdf

[Someone]

But do any of them have dedicated teams, that buy the latest chip or whatever, and then just reverse engineer it ? And are any of them open about it, like so your job title is reverse engineer ?

Have done this. Not a dedicated team. Release cycles were/are long enough it wouldn't be full time, let alone full time across the range of technical specialties needed to consider all the parts of the design. People from R&D would look at bits that "interested" them. The businesses are very hidden about it, going to lengths so that the retail/sales chain can't figure out where/who the products were delivered to.

[Jr460]

Yes!!!!

At one time I worked for a General Motors company.   While you were looked at strangely, (since you got a good discount on GM cars), or in some cases UAW people would vandalize your non-GM car in the company lot in day light, if you had a non-GM car in many cases the test garage would have you pull it in for a free oil change or brake job, etc.   They would not do a complete tare-down, but sure would inspect and document everything they could.

In one case  locL sports star had  rare non-US luxury car.   Someone got him to drive it into theist garage as part of a visit so he could sign pictures and do press stuff with the staff.   He knew what they were doing to his car, but to someone outside, everything looked legit.

At one time I had to visit some folks at the GM proving grounds.   I parked next to something that had all kinds lumps and bumps Velcored to the outside of it.   I asked and they said, of that the brand new XYZ car, and the press and others sit outside the fence with a long lens and try to get pictures of the new designs.   So they change the shape of it all the time to hide the final look.   Hey, you want to go out to lunch in the Bently?   They had all kinds of cars tucked away that if they were back together and not part of some test, just grab the keys and go.   Most of them were acquired thru close relatives of GM employees.   Here is the cash, go have you mother buy X and enjoy it for 6 months, then it would get sold to some holing company and mom would get also get a great deal on GM car to replace it.

I heard it was not just GM, but all the American car companies did it, but kept it quiet.   It was shock when car companies from Japan would just take detailed pictures and pull out measuring devices on cars at the big shows.   They figured you are doing to us, we do to you, why waste time hiding it.   The American companies got all worked up and had the people from the Japanese companies tossed out of car shows.

[coppercone2]

meanwhile at university...

[NiHaoMike]

The businesses are very hidden about it, going to lengths so that the retail/sales chain can't figure out where/who the products were delivered to.

I remember when Benson Leung ordered many USB-C cables and chargers to test them for spec compliance but then ran into issues with Amazon no longer wanting to sell to him. I guess Amazon was afraid of ending up with stock that nobody wants to buy anymore (because of the bad reviews) and doesn't care about selling stuff that's out of spec.

[rstofer]

I worked for a rather large company and we weren't even allowed to have competitor's catalogs (even those given out at conferences or via distributors/retailers) nor any document that had a copyright.  We couldn't even have ball caps of competing products nor could we go out to lunch with salesmen from different divisions lest their competitors think their tie-in was non-competitive.

Yes, it was nuts.  Sometimes it goes like that.

[coppercone2]

I worked for a rather large company and we weren't even allowed to have competitor's catalogs (even those given out at conferences or via distributors/retailers) nor any document that had a copyright.  We couldn't even have ball caps of competing products nor could we go out to lunch with salesmen from different divisions lest their competitors think their tie-in was non-competitive.

Yes, it was nuts.  Sometimes it goes like that.

meanwhile after 5pm...

[jmelson]

At companies like Intel/AMD/Nvidia/Samsung/etc, I know there's employee's that go back and forth between some companies, and corporate espionage, and probably some market rigging.

But do any of them have dedicated teams, that buy the latest chip or whatever, and then just reverse engineer it ? And are any of them open about it, like so your job title is reverse engineer ? I saw a movie about something like that once.

I was in Dearborn, MI, headquarters of Ford Motor Co.  In the parking lot, they had several small cars that had been stripped like a ghetto job.  Hood, doors, etc. all off the body, drivetrain missing, wheels and suspension off.  And, I'm pretty sure these were NOT Ford products.  So, clearly they do.  I make motion control products, and one of the larger makers ordered one servo amp off my web site.  I can only guess why, but checking for infringements might be a good guess.
Jon

[KE5FX]

The conventional wisdom is that every new Corvette generation starts with the purchase of one of the current-gen 911s.  GM takes it apart for study and competitive analysis, and doesn't make a big secret out of it. 

Rip off the best, forget the rest.  That way, everybody ends up with better products at the end of the day.