Who actually makes your parts
SolveProto is not a factory, and this page explains what that means for an order. The engineering, the schedule and the paperwork stay with us. Material, machining and inspection happen at partner facilities in Dongguan and Shenzhen — qualified before your drawing ever reaches them, and named to you under NDA.
One order, two lanes, no gaps
Most prototype problems are not machining problems. They are handoff problems: a question nobody asked, a revision nobody tracked, a shipment nobody owned.
Stays with SolveProto
- Drawing review and DFM An engineer reads the geometry — and the callouts — before anyone prices the part.
- The quote Price, lead time and the assumptions behind both, issued by a named engineer within 24 hours.
- The schedule Tracked against the quoted date. If it moves, you hear it from us before the date passes.
- Quality coordination Inspection booked inside the lead time, records collected and attached — not chased afterwards.
- Shipping and paperwork Invoice, packing list, customs documents, and an inbox that a person reads.
Happens at the partner facility
- Material purchase Stock bought against mill certificates, with lot numbers recorded to your order.
- Machining, forming, printing or casting To the drawing and the DFM notes you approved — not to a “standard interpretation”.
- In-house inspection First-off part measured, then in-process checks on critical features while the batch runs.
- Packing To your instruction — labels, desiccant, split cartons — photographed before the courier collects.
How a factory becomes a partner
A facility joins the network for one process at a time, and only after all five steps below. None of it is an email introduction.
- 01
Certificate verified at the source
ISO 9001 is the floor for every facility; IATF 16949 and ISO 13485 lines are used where the part needs them. Certificates are checked against the issuing body’s registry — not accepted as an email attachment.
- 02
Capability matched to the work
Machine envelope, tolerance class, material experience and current load are matched to the order. A tight five-axis housing does not go to a three-axis shop because the price looked good.
- 03
Material traceability
Mill certificates and lot numbers are recorded against your order, so a batch can be traced before a problem exists — not after one does.
- 04
First-article approval
The first part is measured before the batch runs. On critical features this is where an order gets stopped, not at final inspection when the material is already cut.
- 05
Monitored, not assumed
We spot-check incoming material, the first part off the machine and a pre-shipment sample ourselves. A facility that misses twice on the same process comes off the list.
The partner network at a glance
Facilities sit in Dongguan and Shenzhen and are chosen per order from the process families below. What is fixed is the qualification standard, not the shop.
Specific facility names, machine serials and certificate numbers are shared under NDA. Many plants restrict them in public marketing and we respect that — ask, and you get them before the order, not after. How the parts themselves are checked is on the quality & NDA page, and what has come out of the network is in the case studies.