From napkin to factory floor.
A Danish engineering and design practice. We take devices, consumer products, and industrial products from a rough sketch to a production line that actually works, using Scandinavian simplicity as a design principle and a proven method for picking the concepts worth building.
You don’t need another deck. You need a product that ships.
Nobody kills a concept by taste-policing here. The gate criteria do.
Innovation projects rarely die because the idea on the napkin was bad. They die because nobody was willing to wipe their mouth with it and throw it in the bin. The Napkin Protocol makes that uncomfortable moment into a method instead of a conflict.
Napkin Dump
Everything out of your head and onto the table, unfiltered. Volume and honesty first. Quality comes later.
The Wipe
Pre-agreed criteria cut what never should have survived the meeting. This is the uncomfortable one.
Fold Test
Can it fold into reality? Fast, cheap pre-validation: prototypes, expert interviews, and an early read on production.
Napkin to Line
The chosen concept becomes a production-ready spec. Full engineering, DFM/DFA, suppliers, and ramp-up plan.
Ran it, unnamed, on a pram that had to fold into the smallest car in the parking lot. It came out with 7 patents and a 19% market share in six months.
03 / Two ways to start
Fixed scope. Fixed price. One honest verdict.
The Concept Decision Sprint
Your entire concept portfolio through the Napkin Protocol, with engineers and designers in the room from day one. You get a decision paper with the 2–3 concepts actually worth your money, plus kill criteria your organization keeps forever.
If The Wipe shows none of your concepts should proceed, we tell you in week two, and you pay 40%. We’d rather kill your project cheaply than build it expensively.
The Wipe Session
Every organization has one: the zombie concept, too invested to kill and too doubtful to fund. We agree the kill criteria first, then score the concept against them, with an engineer’s live read on whether it can actually be built.
You leave with a verdict: kill it, fix it, or fund it. Maximum two sessions per month. We have products to ship too.
Every great product starts as a bad drawing on a napkin. Thirteen years in, that’s still the part we’re best at finishing.
Tell us where you are.
Napkin stage, prototype stage, or “we need to be in production in nine months.” We’ll tell you honestly whether we’re the right team for it.
Napkin Engineering Group
Brønsholmdalsvej 119
2980 Kokkedal
Denmark
hello@napkineng.com
+45 31 4000 90