Show HN: Paperd.ink – an open-source e-paper development board
paperd.ink (https://paperd.ink) is an open-source e-paper development board. We wanted to build something with e-paper given its low-power nature and beautiful, high contrast display which complements your environment and is easy on the eye. Thus, we started working on something to be developed along the lines of Arduino, Raspberry Pi’s open-source ecosystem.

paperd.ink has a 4.2” e-paper display comes mounted on the PCB which we have designed to be a general-purpose development board suitable for your projects and applications. You can sync calendars, set up your home IoT dashboard, get to-do lists, and notifications, display art, etc. We have used an ESP32-based microcontroller with WiFi, Bluetooth, and microUSB connectivity. The board can be programmed in Arduino IDE, micropython, or ESP-IDF, you can check out the documentation at docs.paperd.ink. paperd.ink is designed to be low power so you can charge the battery once and go on for months on it depending on the refresh rate. It’s suitable to display low to medium latency or static information. Every paperd.ink comes with a hand-polished, 3D-printed external enclosure.

The first paperd.ink prototype was first posted on Show HN (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22340398) and other related communities (Reddit, Hackaday, etc) a little more than 2 years ago. We had a landing page, a short video of the prototype, and a user survey form asking a couple of questions along with a “Would you like to be a part of the waitlist?” question in the end. We got quite an interest from everyone on it so we decided to move ahead.

After receiving a positive response to the prototype, the next step was to figure out how to actually bring the product to the real world. We had no upfront capital required for manufacturing so we decided to do a crowdfunding campaign (finding a platform supporting our country India was another issue). At the same time, the pandemic happened which delayed everything because of unfeasible component prices, supply chain issues, and lockdowns everywhere. After researching thoroughly and formulating a production plan and figuring out unit economics, we launched the crowdfunding campaign roughly last year and had the 2nd Show HN post (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27331311). In the course of promoting the campaign, we got in contact with FOSS United which is a non-profit foundation that aims at promoting and strengthening the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) ecosystem in India. FOSS United offered us a grant and that’s how we survived despite failing to achieve our crowdfunding target goal (we had ~40%).

After accepting the grant, we tweaked the PCB a bit and redesigned the external enclosure to make it ready for production. Scouted for manufacturers, suppliers, and shipping agents. Samples were ordered and tested. Test criteria and SOPs were exchanged. Vacuum casting (or any other method of manufacturing) of the enclosures was out of the question given the high NRE cost and high quantity needed to be manufactured, so we 3D printed them. Finally, the first batch was ready in the inventory to be shipped. All the orders received until now have been shipped and users should start receiving them shortly. Thanks to the HN community and our early supporters for everything. And special thanks to Daniel (moderator) for helping with the post. We plan to get feedback on the first batch and then decide on how to move forward. Please feel free to ask any questions!