Phase3D Sets Up Online Store for Quality Assurance Software

Inspection software startup Phase3D has started an online store for its in-situ quality assurance Fringe Inspection software. This move should make it easier for people to quickly purchase the software without the need for lots of meetings. A quick transparent purchasing process could help persuade new people to try its tools without requiring the time and cost associated with salespeople. That can keep costs low for both the startup and its customers. In a new era of more conservative investment and spending, such a tactic makes a lot of sense. Keeping costs low, while making the product accessible, is just the thing to let Phase3D conserve cash while growing.

Right now, the store option doesn’t give you all the information or let you purchase everything. But, it should eventually make the sales process easier. The company’s website has also been updated with more technical information and content.

Phase3D founder Niall O’Dowd said that,

“Launching our new site and shop is about making it easier for engineers to take action. We’ve taken the guesswork out of evaluating monitoring tools by putting clear, transparent information front and center. This supports our mission to bring measurement-based quality assurance to additive manufacturing.”

When buying things, some people love to interact, ask questions, and perhaps even actively grill those that they’re thinking of buying from. Others prefer to take their time, and research different options at their own pace and manner. Especially for the latter group, a DIY approach that is more up front with information seems to be a healthy way to go about it. I personally totally hate when people make you talk to a sales person before disclosing any key information right away. I also hate it when companies are not transparent about what it is that they can do. Surely, you spamming me is not your entire marketing plan? To be more generous with information comes from a position of strength. Especially for those who are more inclined towards introversion and efficiency, the current spam-a-lot, sales call badgering approach is a burden.

It’s super smart therefore to let people learn at their own pace and find out as much as they want to without having to jump through hoops. Inspection used to be some kind of jazzercise exercise where you did an awkward dance with a not so robotic arm. It has come a long way, but is still rooted in very statistics-driven approaches. Precision is key, and one has to assume that QA people generally are not the most “people” people in the engineering organization, which is probably also not the most people person part of the organization as a whole. So especially for that group, this is a sensible thing to do. Also, the market has changed. Where before you wanted to hire some shiny new growth hacker, replete with Beer Pong muscle memory and TikTok dance moves, now we’re all taking a more staid approach. It’s not about 10X and 20X, but profits and having a sustainable business. I’m fascinated by the idea that maybe for Phase3D, the best approach would be to stay small. A focus on key in-house developers and experts would see them slowly build a small core team through sustained profits. Self-service and easier ways to get a hold of the product could play an important part in that. Whereas with laser powder bed fusion machines, big is beautiful, the software used to manage them could end up being small is beautiful.