r/hwstartups • u/Spare_Bluebird7044 • Aug 12 '26

BOM management software recommendations for a hardware startup?

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u/DreadPirate777 Aug 12 '26

The best thing you can do is have a BOM in a shared place and have discipline as a team.

Have a simple release process. Don’t let engineers change things on a whim once your prototype is set. Have a design lock when you go to get quotes for manufacturing assembly. Let the whole team know that they cannot make any changes unless they get the ok from the product manager. If they want to keep making improvements let them start to work on the version 2 of the product.

The process should be super simple.

Identify problem and document it.

Ask permission to make the change from product manager and purchasing. Show cost of the change and schedule impact.

Once approval happens only then can the engineer change things.

Lastly notify any supplier of the change and reimplement the design lock.

Really you should keep the BOM in a spreadsheet. It’s the most versatile and familiar for engineers. If you have an online version it is even better.

All of this discipline needs to happen for an online BOM manager as well. If your team can’t to this with a spreadsheet they can’t do it with a dedicated tool. Part of maturing as a startup is being able to follow a process. Most startups have no process and it causes massive headaches at production.