@digitaldisaster
I take it back, I don't think any bank manager will agree with your "at cost to a bunch of people from some website" and certainly you will have to have very good proof of potential bulk orders from customers (who need a 64bit dual processor full-ATX development board? :)
Personally I don't think you HAVE that proof. You can't run a business on wishful thinking.
If you plan to do it, you have to plan to cover yourself on board sales no matter what you do. Even if the markup is so terribly low that it could not be considered retail sanity, you still need to add a markup. Component prices change wildly in the semiconductor industry, one day you'll have a chip costing you nothing, the next it will jump £15 and you need 1000 of them..
The only way you can really orchestrate an "at cost" sales method is to list the board specs on your site, with no price. After you do a production run, then you can solicit orders on your website, and paper-invoice people for the system at the exact amount you consider as cost.
You should provide a full BOM and price breakdown in order to validate the customer price.
Essentially, it's a silly idea isn't it?
Go get a real company set up. Get VAT registered or become a charity of that makes it happier for you; get a loan to cover the initial cost of the development board, which you can pay back through a slight buffing of the cost price (cost + loan interest + price protection for yourself) - it need not be profit.
Neko |
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