What challenges have you faced during the launch of a hardware product?

The list is long I am afraid. Thankfully most of those were logistical challenges, and not related to user experience or customer satisfaction. Be sure to run your product through sufficient number of early adopters, Beta testers. Here are a few logistical challenges -

• Forecasting - In one of my product launches, we ran out of our product in less than 1 week as we completely underestimated demand. It took us 3 months to ramp up to the actual demand. The lesson learnt - Think ahead and decide how you will address the forecast variance.

• International launches - Managing simultaneous launches internationally will be difficult (mostly due to compliance requirements). Plan ahead and launch in phases.

• Reliability - Be aware of the reliability of your product, and expected returns. Plan ahead on how you will respond to RMAs.

• Yield - Your engineering and manufacturing team should be able to tell you in case of any yield issues. Do not launch your products if the manufacturing yield is not high enough (Low yield - means there are unresolved quality problems that may surface later or that you cannot meet customer demand).