Hard Steel Alloy
Hard Steel Alloy
Idea Description
My partner Dr. Woods invented a new hard steel alloy that does not need heat treating. The steel is through hardened from a casting and is rust resistant. We believe this steel can be used in many many wear applications including blades for cutters, paddles, shafts, gears and steel plates. By eliminating heat treating this material will be very cost effective and replace basic steel is most applications.
What will you do if you win $10,000 for this idea?
We will pay for the cost of testing the steel for rolling, bar making, powderizing, casting, and forging. Plus we need to make many sample parts to give to potential customers.
Vote for it now.
For the purposes of this advice, let's stipulate that your process works and is scalable. (I'm skeptical, but that's part of my job!)
The first thing to do is make sure you have filed for the proper intellectual property protection (i.e. patents), both in the US and abroad. A good patent attorney can do this for you, as well as advise you of the critical deadlines. Depending on the number of patents and their complexity, this can run from $20,000 to $200,000, and will take a couple of years. The key is to get the patents filed - you are protected from that date forward, even though the patents have not been awarded to you yet.
Second, make sure you have a good non-disclosure agreement in place with everyone you speak with (other than VCs, who won't sign them).
Finally - and I cannot say this strongly enough - DO NOT TRY TO DO THIS YOURSELF!
If you actually have what you think you do, then the way to make money off of it is to license it to existing steel producers. They have all of the infrastructure you lack -- not just the foundries,…more but also the suppliers and the saleforces and the distribution systems and, above all, the experienced management. The only thing they don't have is your process.
So, rather than trying to raise the capital required to build the stuff that they have in order to be able to compete, you can license the process to them. Just make sure that you have really solid patent protection, and someone on your team who has *proven* success with licensing negotiations.
Good luck!!