Hardware Podcasts

Hatch Duo: Industrial Design, Navigating AI, Branding, Hardware Innovation | Hard Tech Podcast #16

Hard Tech Podcast · 20 Mar 2024 · 1h 51m

AI in practice: 2 real uses of AI described

What this episode covers

Michael Yim and Jonathan Tai, co-founders of Hatch Duo, an AI-enhanced industrial design and engineering studio, discuss their journey from bootstrapping to serving early-stage hardware startups. They detail their 'design capital' model, where they invest in-kind to help pre-seed companies build prototypes to secure funding, and explain how they blend human creativity with AI tools like FLO.ai to enhance efficiency. The conversation covers the importance of brand identity, the challenges of working with first-time founders, and their strategic use of social media for client acquisition.

AI in practice

Where this conversation describes AI being used to build or deliver a product. Part of the AI in practice tracker.

DesignFLO.ai

The co-founders built an AI-powered mood board tool to automate the collection and organization of reference images, reducing the time designers spend on manual curation and allowing them to focus on creative direction.

“we realize how much time our designers are spending on moveboarding on collecting images, on searching for images, We thought that was a very smooth transition, low hanging fruit, where we can create a digital moveboard system using AI.”

Speaker 3 · Hear it at 1:36:21

Running the companyGPT or Geminireview time from 10-15 minutes to a few minutes

The co-founders use large language models to draft and edit emails, significantly reducing the time spent on written communication and freeing up hours for other tasks.

“I'm not having to, you know, proofread and edit my emails anymore. I can, you know, just upload it and have, you know, write a few sentences and then the GPT or Gemini will be able to help me communicate the rest of my thoughts.”

Speaker 3 · Hear it at 1:01:05

Most relevant to

early-stage companies

Topics

Mentioned

Companies
Hatch Duo, Aggregate, Nest, Ring, Tesla, Apple, Fitbit, Foxconn, VA Systems, Hyundai
Products
FLO.ai, Pokemon Go
Tools
Gravity Sketch, SolidWorks, CAD
Also
KitKat

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