Design & innovation consulting
Ideas become things.
BRCH Innovations is the consulting practice of Brian Chamberlain — twenty years of design and engineering across hardware, software, and everything in between. I help teams think wide about a problem, then build deep until it ships.
Think wide. Build deep.
Hard problems don't respect disciplines. The best solutions come from seeing the whole landscape — and then going deep enough to ship.
Wide
I've designed IoT sensor systems, built clinical research platforms, fabricated sustainable consumer products, constructed 3D printers from scratch, and shipped software from Palm Pilot apps to Web3 tools. That breadth means I can find the ideas your problem is hiding — the ones a specialist walks past.
Deep
Breadth only matters if you can follow through. I'm equally at home designing PCBs and APIs, soldering components and writing firmware, modeling enclosures and crafting user experiences. When a direction is chosen, I follow it all the way down: prototype, test, manufacture, launch.
From idea to shipped product
Every engagement follows the same arc I use in my own workshop. You can bring me in at any stage.
- 01
Ideas
Frame the problem and sketch the possibilities — wide before narrow.
- 02
Research
Study the market, the prior art, and the physics. Find out what is actually hard.
- 03
Experiments
Cheap, fast prototypes that answer the riskiest questions first.
- 04
Projects
Serious builds: engineering, iteration, and honest testing.
- 05
Products
Manufacturing, launch, and the details that make something feel finished.
Where I can help
Discovery & strategy
An honest read on whether an idea is worth building. Market and technical research, feasibility studies, and a clear map of the risks.
Product design
From first sketch to working prototype — industrial design, user experience, and the engineering that makes it real. Hardware, software, or both.
Build & launch
Software development, electronics, and digital manufacturing to carry a validated prototype through to a shipped product.
Twenty years of making things real
NASA zero-gravity research
Wrote the software and adapted the hardware for pool-boiling experiments flown on NASA reduced-gravity flights.
Clinical research platforms
Designed and built patient registry, trial monitoring, and consent-authoring systems for the NIH and Northwestern University.
Web3 R&D at ConsenSys Mesh
Helped form Team Zero, an R&D group taking early-stage Ethereum products from concept to launch.
Sustainable product company
Founded Tree Farm Creative — designed, manufactured, and sold home goods made from renewable materials.
Digital manufacturing
Built zero-inventory, print-on-demand businesses making low-volume parts that traditional manufacturing cannot touch.
Solar Decathlon
Designed and ran the electrical system for the University of Maryland entry — tied for first in solar energy production.
The full journey — experiments, failures and all — is documented at brianlc.com.
Start with a conversation
Tell me what you're working on and where it's stuck. We'll set up an initial consult — a working session, not a sales call — and figure out whether I can help.