Proof of Concept vs. Prototype: What Agencies Need to Know

Aug 20

Your agency just pitched a game-changing idea for a client: a piece of smart merchandise that will make their campaign unforgettable. The client loves it, the creatives are excited, and the pressure is on to deliver. But there’s a nagging question in the back of your mind: can we actually build this thing? This is where so many brilliant physical product ideas stall. You need to know if the core technology is viable before you commit a serious budget. A Proof of Concept (POC) is your answer. It’s a small, focused experiment designed to de-risk your project from day one. Before you even get to a proof of concept prototype, the POC validates the single most challenging technical function, giving you the confidence to move forward.

Key Takeaways

Treat a POC as a technical experiment, not a product preview. Its sole purpose is to answer one question—"Is this technically possible?"—before you invest in design, saving you from confusing a feasibility test with a client-facing prototype.
A POC is your best tool for protecting budgets and securing buy-in. It finds deal-breaking technical flaws early when they're cheap to fix and provides the tangible proof needed to get clients and stakeholders to confidently approve the project.
Define a single question and clear success metrics before you start. A successful POC is hyper-focused. By establishing a specific technical goal and resisting the urge to add polish, you get a fast, data-driven "go" or "no-go" decision without wasting time or money.

What is a Proof of Concept (POC)?

Think of a Proof of Concept as a small, focused experiment. When your agency has a big, ambitious idea for a physical product—like a smart device for a campaign or an interactive piece of merchandise—a POC is the first step to see if the core technology is even possible. It’s not about building the product; it’s about answering a single, critical question: “Can we technically pull this off?”

A POC is designed to test the feasibility of one specific function before you invest serious time and money into a full-blown project. It’s a quick, targeted validation that confirms your groundbreaking idea has a solid technical foundation to build upon. This step is all about managing risk and making sure you’re heading in a viable direction from day one.

What Makes a POC a POC?

A Proof of Concept zeroes in on a single, make-or-break technical challenge. Its entire purpose is to determine if a core function of your product idea can actually be built. Forget about aesthetics, user interface, or multiple features—a POC is purely about technical validation. For example, if you want to create a branded smart mug that glows when a user’s favorite team scores, the POC would focus only on one thing: successfully triggering the light based on a real-time data feed. It answers the question, "Is this technically possible with the tools we have?" It’s a stripped-down test to validate a product idea at its most fundamental level.

Why It’s All About Technical Feasibility

The main goal of a POC is to give your project a clear green or red light before you commit a client’s budget. It’s your first and best tool for reducing risk. If the POC fails, you’ve discovered a major roadblock early, saving an incredible amount of time and money that would have been spent on a project destined to fail. If it succeeds, you and your stakeholders can move forward with confidence, knowing the foundational technology is sound. This go/no-go signal is invaluable. It transforms a creative "what if" into a tangible "yes, we can," giving you the evidence needed to proceed to the next stage of product development.

Clearing Up Common POC Myths

Let’s be clear: a POC is not a prototype. It’s not a scaled-down or ugly version of the final product. A POC is a separate, internal-facing project built to test a very specific technical assumption. It’s often a tangle of wires on a board or a rough assembly of parts that is never meant to be seen by clients or end-users. Its value isn't in its appearance but in its findings. While a prototype is designed to show how a product will look and feel, a POC is built to prove if a core piece of it can even work. Understanding this distinction between a POC and a prototype is key to managing expectations and focusing your team on the right goal.

POC vs. Prototype vs. MVP: What’s the Real Difference?

When you’re turning a big creative idea into a physical product, you’ll hear the terms Proof of Concept (POC), prototype, and Minimum Viable Product (MVP) thrown around a lot. It’s easy to use them interchangeably, but they represent three very different stages, each with its own goal, budget, and timeline. For agencies, knowing the difference is key to managing client expectations, setting realistic budgets, and making sure your brilliant campaign asset doesn’t get stuck in development limbo. Think of them as sequential steps: first, you find out if it can be built (POC), then you figure out how it should be built (Prototype), and finally, you build a simple version to see if people want it (MVP).

Defining the Goal of Each

Each stage is designed to answer a specific, critical question about your product idea. A Proof of Concept is all about technical validation. Its only job is to answer the question, “Is this core function technically possible?” It’s a small, focused experiment, not a polished product. A prototype, on the other hand, is built to answer, “How will this product look, feel, and work?” It’s a tangible model that lets you test the design, ergonomics, and user experience. Finally, a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is the first version that goes to market. It asks, “Will people actually use this?” An MVP includes just enough core features to attract early adopters and gather real-world feedback.

When to Build Each One

Knowing when to build each one helps you use your resources wisely. You should build a POC when you’re dealing with a completely new or risky technical challenge and need to confirm it can be done before committing a bigger budget. It’s perfect for testing an unproven technology or a unique mechanism. You should move on to a prototype when you need to get feedback on the product’s design and usability. This is the stage where you can convince investors or stakeholders with a physical model they can hold and interact with. An MVP is the right move when you’re ready to test your core business idea in the real world and see how the market reacts to a functional, albeit basic, version of your product.

Who Is It For? (Users vs. Stakeholders)

The audience for each stage is completely different. A POC is almost always for an internal audience—your engineering team, developers, and maybe a few key technical decision-makers. It’s a behind-the-scenes test that’s never meant for public eyes. A prototype, however, is designed to be shared. Its audience includes stakeholders, investors, and small groups of potential users who can provide feedback on the design and feel. It’s a crucial tool for communication and alignment. The MVP’s audience is the most important of all: real customers. It’s released to a segment of your target market to see if they will actually use—and ideally, pay for—your product.

What You Get From Each

The deliverable from each stage gives you a different kind of value. The main outcome of a POC is a simple yes or no on technical feasibility. It’s a risk-reduction tool that helps you decide if an idea is worth developing further. From a prototype, you get critical feedback that helps you find problems with the design and user experience before you commit to expensive manufacturing tooling. It’s all about refining the product’s form and function. The outcome of an MVP is market validation. You get real user data that tells you which features are essential and which ones aren't, guiding your entire product roadmap based on actual behavior, not just assumptions.

How Much Time and Money to Expect

Your budget and timeline will expand with each progressive stage. A POC is the quickest and most affordable, often taking just a few days to a couple of weeks. The cost is very low because you’re only building the bare minimum to test a single function. A prototype is a bigger commitment, typically taking a few weeks to a couple of months. The cost is moderate, as it involves more detailed design and development work to create a realistic model. The MVP is the most significant investment in both time and money. Its development and support can take several months to a year, as you’re building a market-ready product that needs to be reliable and scalable.

When Should You Build a Proof of Concept?

Knowing when to build a Proof of Concept is just as important as knowing what it is. A POC isn’t a mandatory step for every project, but it’s an incredibly smart move when you’re dealing with uncertainty. For agencies, this is your go-to tool when a client brings you an ambitious idea for a physical product that hinges on a new or unproven technology. Think of it as a strategic pause before you go all-in. It’s the step you take to answer one critical question: “Is this technically possible?” before you commit a serious budget and your team’s valuable time. A POC is your first line of defense against unforeseen technical roadblocks and a powerful way to build confidence in a creative concept.

It’s the bridge between a brilliant campaign idea and a real-world, engineered product. You use a POC to de-risk the most innovative—and therefore most uncertain—parts of your project. Whether you’re developing a piece of smart merchandise or a complex interactive installation, the POC isolates the core technical challenge and tackles it head-on. This focused approach saves money, clarifies the path forward, and gives your clients the assurance that their vision is not just creative, but also achievable. It’s about making informed decisions early, so you can move into the design and prototyping phases with a solid, validated foundation.

To Validate a Core Idea Early On

The best time to build a POC is right at the beginning, before an idea gains too much momentum. You and your client might be excited about a concept, but that excitement can quickly fade if you discover down the line that the core function is impossible to build. A POC is a quick, low-cost reality check. It isolates the riskiest part of your idea and puts it to the test. For example, if your campaign idea is a smart coaster that chills a drink, the POC would focus only on proving that the cooling technology can work in that small form factor. It’s not about what the coaster looks like; it’s about confirming the technical feasibility of the core idea before you move forward.

To Prove a Technical Function Can Work

Sometimes, your product idea isn’t entirely new, but it relies on one specific, tricky technical function. A POC is perfect for this. It’s a small, internal project designed to verify that a key feature will perform as expected. You don’t need to build the entire product—just the part you’re worried about. Imagine you’re creating an interactive display with a unique mechanical movement. Instead of building the whole enclosure, you’d build a POC just for that mechanism. This focused approach lets you confirm that the most challenging part of the project is viable. It’s a targeted experiment that answers a simple yes-or-no question about a critical function, giving you the green light to proceed with engineering the rest of the product.

To Identify and Reduce Project Risks

Every new product comes with risks. Will the battery last long enough? Can the materials withstand the stress? Will the electronics fit in the housing? A POC is your best tool for identifying and mitigating these technical risks before they derail your project. By setting specific goals for your POC, you can systematically test your biggest assumptions. Finding out that a chosen material cracks under pressure during a small-scale POC is a minor setback. Discovering that same issue after you’ve ordered thousands of units is a catastrophe. A POC protects your client’s budget and your agency’s timeline by surfacing deal-breaking problems early when they are still easy and inexpensive to fix.

To Get Your Team and Investors on Board

A successful POC is one of the most effective tools for getting buy-in from clients, investors, or internal leadership. It’s hard to argue with tangible proof. Presenting a working POC transforms an abstract idea into a credible, buildable concept. It shows stakeholders you’ve done your homework and that their investment is grounded in proven technology. Instead of just pitching a vision, you’re demonstrating a solution. This evidence-based approach gives everyone the confidence to approve budgets and commit resources. Securing stakeholder buy-in is much easier when you can back up your creative pitch with a functional POC that proves the core of your idea is solid.

How to Plan Your POC for Success

A successful Proof of Concept doesn’t happen by accident. It’s the result of a clear, focused plan that treats this early stage with the seriousness it deserves. Think of it less like a casual experiment and more like a strategic mission. Your goal is to get a definitive answer to a critical question, and that requires a roadmap. By defining your question, specs, budget, and success metrics upfront, you ensure your POC delivers real value and gives your team the confidence to move forward—or the wisdom to pivot before you’ve invested too much.

Define Your Core Question

Before you build anything, you need to know exactly what you’re trying to prove. A POC should be designed to answer one core question about technical feasibility. This isn’t the time to explore aesthetics or user experience; it’s about the fundamental mechanics. Is it possible to create a self-heating mug that stays at 135°F for three hours using this specific battery? Can we engineer a hinge that allows a package to open in a specific, dramatic way without breaking? When you establish clear objectives, you give the project a sharp focus. This single question will guide every decision you make and keep the project from spiraling into a full-blown prototype.

Outline the Technical Specs

Even a rough POC needs a plan. Outlining the technical specifications is about documenting the essential components and parameters of your test. What materials will you use? What specific electronic parts are required? What are the key performance indicators you need to test? This isn't about creating a polished final design; it's about creating a clear recipe for your experiment. Proper documentation from the start prevents confusion and ensures that the knowledge gained from the POC can be easily transferred to the engineering team for the next phase. This simple document becomes the blueprint for your test and the record of your initial assumptions.

Plan Your Time and Budget

A POC is an investment, not a side project. It requires dedicated time and resources to execute properly, so you need to plan for both. Be realistic about what you can achieve within your constraints. Testing a new type of biodegradable plastic might take weeks to observe its properties, while testing a simple mechanism could be done in a day. A well-defined Proof of Concept guide will always include budgeting for time and money. Allocating a specific budget—even a small one—forces you to stay focused on the core question and prevents scope creep. This initial investment is what protects your agency and your client from sinking a much larger budget into an idea that was never technically viable.

Establish Clear Success Metrics

How will you know if your POC actually worked? You need to define what success looks like before you start. These metrics should be directly tied to your core question and be measurable and unambiguous. For example, if your question is about battery life, the success metric could be "the device must operate continuously for a minimum of 100 hours on a single charge." These criteria remove subjectivity from the evaluation process. The POC either meets the benchmark or it doesn’t. This data-driven approach makes the final go/no-go decision straightforward and helps you present a clear, actionable outcome to your client and internal stakeholders.

How to Handle Common POC Roadblocks

Even the most well-planned projects can hit a snag. That’s just part of the creative process. The good news is that most Proof of Concept roadblocks are predictable, which means you can prepare for them. Getting ahead of these common issues will keep your project moving smoothly and ensure you get the clear, technical answers you need without derailing your timeline or budget.

Working Through Technical Hurdles

A POC can feel stuck if you don’t know what you’re trying to prove. The biggest technical hurdle often isn’t the tech itself—it’s a fuzzy goal. Before your team or an engineering partner starts building, you need to define what success looks like in concrete terms. Instead of saying, "Let's see if this motor works," specify, "Can this motor run for 60 seconds at 500 RPM without overheating?" Having clear and measurable objectives gives your POC a distinct purpose and a finish line, turning a vague idea into a testable hypothesis. This clarity prevents endless tinkering and focuses everyone on answering the core technical question.

Making the Most of Your Budget

Nothing drains a budget faster than scope creep and unexpected problems. While it’s tempting to keep POC budgets lean, it’s critical to account for both materials and the expertise needed to execute the build. Common challenges during development often stem from poor initial planning. To protect your budget, work with your technical partner to map out the entire process upfront. A good engineering team can help you anticipate costs beyond just the components, including assembly time, testing, and potential iterations. This foresight prevents surprises and ensures your funds are used to get a definitive answer, not just a pile of parts.

Keeping Your Project on Schedule

Agency timelines are always tight, and POCs are no exception. The key to staying on schedule is to ruthlessly protect the scope. A POC is designed to test one core function, not the entire product vision. When time constraints are tight, it’s easy to make rushed decisions or try to cram too many features into the test. Define the single most important question you need to answer and focus all your energy there. If you’re testing a new battery system, don’t worry about the button’s click-feel or the color of the enclosure. A focused scope is a fast scope, and it’s the best way to get a clear result without blowing past your deadline.

Keeping Everyone in the Loop

When you’re juggling clients, creatives, and technical partners, clear communication is everything. A POC can quickly go off the rails if stakeholders aren’t aligned or if feedback happens in silos. The solution is to establish a simple and consistent communication plan from day one. This doesn't need to be complicated—a weekly email update or a 15-minute check-in call can work wonders. Make sure everyone knows their role and who the final decision-maker is for key questions. A clear communication plan ensures that progress is visible, feedback is centralized, and the entire team stays focused on the same goal.

How to Measure Your POC's Outcome

Once your Proof of Concept is built, the real work begins. A POC isn’t just a box to check; it’s a tool for gathering critical information that will shape the rest of your project. Measuring its outcome isn’t about judging the POC itself but about using it to make a smart, informed decision for your client’s product. The goal here is clarity. You need to walk away with a straightforward answer about the technical viability of your idea and a clear path forward. This evaluation process is what turns a simple technical test into a powerful strategic asset, protecting your timeline, your budget, and your client’s investment.

Did It Prove the Technical Concept?

At its heart, a POC is designed to answer a single, crucial question: Can this core function actually work? The first step in measuring its outcome is to return to that initial question. Before you started, you should have established very specific, measurable objectives. Now is the time to assess the POC against those goals. Did the custom sensor array detect the right inputs? Did the new material bond correctly? The answer should be a clear "yes" or "no." Ambiguity is the enemy here. If the outcome is murky, the POC hasn't served its purpose, leaving you without the concrete validation needed to confidently move to the next phase.

Analyzing Key Performance Data

A simple "yes, it worked" isn't enough. You need to dig into the performance data to understand how it worked. This is where your predefined success metrics come into play. Look at the quantitative results: How much power did it consume? What was the data transfer speed? How did it perform under stress? This data provides the objective evidence you need to evaluate the concept’s real-world potential. It helps you identify potential challenges early, like if a component overheats or a mechanism is too slow. This analysis ensures your project’s objectives are not just met, but understood in a way that makes the next steps actionable and strategic.

Weighing the Costs vs. Benefits

Now that you know the concept is technically feasible, you have to ask if it’s financially viable. A POC gives you your first real glimpse into the resources required to bring this idea to life. Analyze the time, materials, and expertise it took to get the POC working. Was it more complex or costly than you initially projected? This is a critical moment to perform a high-level cost-benefit analysis. Based on what you learned, does the potential payoff for the final product justify the development costs? Meticulous documentation of the process is key here, as it provides the raw data needed to forecast the budget for a full production run.

Making the Final Go/No-Go Decision

With all the information gathered, it’s time to make the call. The final step is to synthesize your findings—the technical validation, performance data, and cost analysis—into a clear recommendation for all stakeholders. This is a collaborative decision. Present your findings to your internal team, your engineering partner, and your client with a compelling, data-backed argument. The outcome is either a "go" (proceed to the prototype phase) or a "no-go" (pivot or shelve the idea). Remember, a "no-go" isn't a failure. It’s a strategic win that saves your agency and your client from investing heavily in an idea that was destined to fail.

Our Top Tips for a Stronger POC

A Proof of Concept can be the smartest investment you make in a new product idea, but only if it’s done right. A weak POC wastes time and budget, while a strong one provides the clarity and confidence needed to move forward. Over the years, we’ve seen what separates a successful POC from a failed one. It comes down to a few key practices that ensure your technical validation process is focused, efficient, and delivers a clear answer. Think of these tips as your playbook for turning a great idea into a buildable reality.

Document Your Process and Findings

It’s tempting to move fast and skip the paperwork, but good documentation is non-negotiable. A POC’s value lives on long after the test is complete, but only if you write it down. Proper documentation is your best defense against the confusion and knowledge gaps that can derail a project during the transition to a full prototype. Keep a clear record of your initial question, the methods you tested, what worked, and what didn't. This log becomes an essential guide for your engineering team and stakeholders, ensuring everyone understands the technical groundwork and the decisions that were made. It’s the blueprint for what comes next.

Assemble the Right Team

A POC is only as good as the team behind it and the goals they set. Before you start, it's critical to establish clear and measurable objectives. Without a specific target, a POC can easily lose its way. For physical products, this means having the right technical experts in the room from day one. Your team needs to include engineers or industrial designers who know how to test for manufacturability, not just function. This ensures the question you’re asking is the right one and that the answer you get is grounded in real-world production constraints.

Focus on the Core Function, Not Polish

This is where agencies can sometimes get tripped up. A POC is not a beauty contest. Its entire purpose is to function as a quick test to see if a core idea can actually be built, not to look like a finished product. Resist the urge to perfect the aesthetics or add secondary features. All that matters is answering your core technical question. Is the hinge mechanism strong enough? Can the sensor communicate with the app? Focusing on a single, critical function keeps the project lean, fast, and on-budget. The polish comes later, once you’ve proven the foundational concept is sound.

Gather and Apply Key Feedback

Ultimately, a POC is a tool for persuasion. You’re building it to convince stakeholders—your client, your boss, your investors—that the project is worth pursuing. To do this effectively, you need to present a compelling argument that is backed by the data from your test. Frame your findings as the answer to the initial question you set out to prove. Show how the results demonstrate the solution's potential and de-risk the project. This isn't just a show-and-tell; it's a conversation. Use the POC to secure stakeholder buy-in and gather the feedback that will shape the next phase of development.

What’s Next After a Successful POC?

Your proof of concept worked—congratulations! That’s a huge milestone. It confirms your core idea is technically possible. But a successful POC isn’t the finish line; it’s the starting pistol for the actual product development race. You’ve answered the question, “Can we build this?” Now, you get to answer the more exciting questions: “How do we make it beautiful? How do we make it durable? And how do we manufacture it at scale?” This is where you move from a raw technical validation to a tangible, market-ready product that will impress your client and connect with their audience.

The next steps are all about building on your initial success with a structured plan. It involves translating your technical findings into a clear handoff, integrating compelling design, refining the engineering for real-world production, and creating a strategic roadmap to guide the project to completion. Skipping these steps is like trying to build a house without a blueprint just because you confirmed the foundation can be poured. Taking the time to plan this transition ensures the momentum from your POC carries straight through to a successful product launch.

Plan Your Handoff to the Next Phase

Before you jump into design or engineering, you need to package up everything you learned from the POC. A clean handoff is critical, and it all comes down to documentation. Without it, you risk creating knowledge gaps that force your development partners to start from scratch. Your goal is to create a clear, concise summary that captures the project’s status, including the technical specs you used, what worked, what didn’t, and any unexpected hurdles you overcame.

This isn’t just about creating a file archive. It’s about creating a strategic guide for the next team. Proper documentation ensures a smooth transition from the POC to the prototyping phase, saving valuable time and budget. Think of it as a relay race—a clean handoff keeps the project moving at top speed.

Integrate Design and Aesthetics

With technical feasibility confirmed, it’s time to focus on how the product will look and feel. This is the stage where your agency’s creative vision and the client’s brand identity come to life. While the POC was purely functional, the next phase is about merging that function with a deliberate form. This is when you bring in industrial designers to wrap the core technology in a shell that is intuitive, ergonomic, and visually compelling.

Great design turns a working device into a desirable product. It’s what makes someone choose your product over another. By using prototypes to engage stakeholders in the design process, you can align the product’s aesthetics with brand goals and user expectations early on, ensuring the final result resonates with its intended audience.

Refine the Engineering for Production

A POC is often a rough assembly of off-the-shelf parts, and that’s perfectly fine for validation. However, it’s rarely ready for mass production. The next step is to refine the engineering to make the product durable, cost-effective, and manufacturable. This process, known as Design for Manufacturing (DFM), involves optimizing every component, selecting the right materials, and ensuring the final assembly is efficient.

This is where mechanical and electrical engineers identify potential production challenges and refine the product’s architecture for scalability. They’ll create detailed CAD models, a complete Bill of Materials (BOM), and assembly instructions that a factory can follow precisely. This crucial step prevents costly surprises and delays down the line.

Build Your Full Product Roadmap

Your POC answered a single, critical question. Now, you need a full product roadmap to guide the rest of the journey. This plan outlines every subsequent phase, from looks-like and works-like prototypes to tooling, factory sourcing, and the first production run. It should include clear timelines, a detailed budget, and key milestones to keep the project on track and all stakeholders aligned.

A roadmap turns your validated concept into an actionable project. It provides transparency for your client and ensures everyone on the team understands the goals and deadlines for each phase. With a clear communication plan and a detailed roadmap, you can confidently lead your project from a simple proof of concept to a polished, shelf-ready product.

How a POC Protects Your Project (and Budget)

Think of a Proof of Concept as your project’s first line of defense. For an agency juggling creative ambitions, client expectations, and tight budgets, the POC is an essential step that de-risks the entire development process. It’s not about building a polished product; it’s about answering one critical question: "Is our core idea technically possible?" By isolating and testing the riskiest part of your concept first, you create a safety net. This focused approach protects your timeline, your budget, and your reputation by ensuring you don't invest heavily in a physical product concept that is destined to fail on a technicality. It’s the smartest way to move a brilliant idea from the whiteboard into the real world with confidence.

Catching Deal-Breakers Early

Every ambitious product idea has a potential deal-breaker—a technical hurdle so significant it could stop the project in its tracks. A POC is designed to find that hurdle immediately. By focusing on the single most challenging function, you can quickly determine if it's a roadblock or just a bump in the road. For example, if your campaign centers on a smart coaster that lights up when a drink is low, the POC would test only the weight-sensing and light-triggering mechanism. This process helps you identify significant issues before they escalate, saving you from discovering a fatal flaw months down the line after you’ve already invested in design, tooling, and materials.

Saving Time and Money

Finding a major technical problem during the manufacturing stage is a budget-killer. A POC helps you uncover these issues at the very beginning when the cost of pivoting is minimal. It’s a small, targeted experiment that confirms feasibility before you commit to the full scope of a project. This approach prevents you from wasting resources on a concept that can’t be built as envisioned. By front-loading the technical validation, you ensure that the time and money spent on later stages—like detailed industrial design and prototyping—are invested in a viable product. This early diligence is one of the most effective ways to manage your project's financial resources and keep your timeline intact.

Securing Stakeholder Confidence

Getting buy-in from clients or internal leadership for a physical product requires more than a great pitch deck. Stakeholders need proof that your creative vision is grounded in reality. A successful POC provides exactly that. It’s tangible evidence that your idea works, transforming a conceptual risk into a calculated investment. Presenting a functional POC demonstrates foresight and technical diligence, which builds immense trust. Instead of just telling stakeholders the idea is possible, you’re showing them. This data-backed approach helps you foster confidence among stakeholders and makes it much easier to secure the budget and support needed to move forward to the prototype and production phases.

Proving Your Idea is Buildable

At its core, a POC is a simple, internal test to confirm that a technical idea can actually be executed. It’s not about looks or user experience; it’s purely about function. Can the electronics fit in the proposed enclosure? Can the mechanism achieve the desired motion? Will the sensor work as expected? A POC answers these fundamental questions. It serves as a preliminary assessment to determine the feasibility of your core concept before you get lost in the details. For agencies, this is the bridge between a creative brainstorm and an engineered reality, ensuring the big idea is not just clever, but also buildable.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I just skip the POC and go straight to a prototype? You certainly can, but it’s a gamble. A prototype is built to figure out how a product will look, feel, and be used. A Proof of Concept is built to confirm if its most essential technical function is even possible. Skipping the POC means you might spend a significant amount of time and money creating a beautiful, well-designed prototype that simply cannot be engineered to work as intended, sending you right back to square one.

What happens if my POC fails? Is the project over? Not at all! In fact, a "failed" POC is actually a huge success. It means you’ve discovered a major technical roadblock at the earliest, cheapest possible stage. This isn't a dead end; it's a strategic pivot point. The POC has done its job by saving you from investing a much larger budget into an idea that was technically flawed from the start. Now you can adjust your approach or rethink the concept with valuable, concrete information.

How much should I expect a POC to cost? There’s no single price tag, as the cost depends entirely on the question you’re trying to answer. Testing a simple mechanical movement will be far less expensive than validating a custom sensor array. However, a POC will always be a small fraction of the cost of a full prototype or production run. Think of it as a minor, strategic investment made to protect the much larger budget you’ll need for the rest of the project.

My idea seems pretty simple. Do I really need a POC? That’s a great question. If your product idea uses common, off-the-shelf components in a way that’s been done many times before, you might be able to skip it. A POC becomes essential when you introduce uncertainty. If you’re combining technologies in a new way, designing a unique mechanism, or pushing the limits of a material, a POC is your tool for managing that risk. It’s for any project where the answer to "can this technically be done?" isn't a definite yes.

Who actually builds the POC? Is this something my agency can do in-house? A POC is typically a collaborative effort. Your agency brings the creative vision and defines the core question that needs to be answered. A technical partner, like an industrial design and engineering firm, then brings the hands-on expertise. They can design the right experiment, source the components, and build the physical test rig to get you a reliable answer. This partnership ensures your creative idea is tested with real-world engineering rigor.

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