The Manufacturing Compliance Committee (MCC) was formed to sets basic standards and verify that these technical, security, and ethical standards are met by manufacturers joining the Helium Network through the HIP19 process.
Manufacturing a Hotspot is a new frontier for most manufacturers. They haven’t dealt with decentralized systems, or the blockchain and its trustless implications and responsibilities. Those features, which on the whole are beneficial, also create a risk that unwary and unethical manufacturers develop and sell products that could negatively affect the network.
The MCC’s mandate is to verify that manufacturers and their respective products meet the minimum functional requirements for a device to participate on the Network. This includes blockchain-related transactions, a check on relevant regulatory requirements for all radio hardware, and that the devices meet the minimum authentication, encryption, and security standards needed to protect the network. The MCC does not test for or enforce general product quality standards, ensure the overall quality of the product, or the manufacturing process. Nor does the MCC test products for optimized RF performance, only basic RF function is reviewed.
The MCC tries to set manufacturers up for success by letting them know the minimum standards they need to meet and perform a cursory (and NOT binding) check on pre-production units.
The MCC reviews the manufacturers at the following points:
The review consists of:
The sole power the MCC wields is a very blunt instrument, which is that the MCC can bestow or withdraw “maker keys”. In layman’s terms, the Maker’s Keys are the passcodes that allow a unit to be added to the blockchain. This is a blunt and weak instrument by design; no one unit or entity should be able to hold the entire ecosystem hostage. If an entity could selectively withdraw any hotspots or group of hotspots' ability to participate in earning blockchain rewards, that entity would hold tremendous and centralized power.
A manufacturer is not bound or controlled by the MCC, the only required inspection points are its initial manufacturer application approval and the subsequent submissions of Helium compatible products for MCC hardware audit and approval.
After being approved, a manufacturer may fail to meet either the technical, security, and/or ethical standards set by the MCC committee. The MCC reserves the right to reassess the conformance of all approved manufacturers and their Helium products at any time. If significant violations are found the MCC may suggest the manufacturer take specific corrective actions and/or at its sole discretion choose to suspend or permanently withdraw the manufactures “maker key(s)”. This will prevent the maker from deploying any new Hotspots to the Helium network.
Due to the nature of a decentralized ecosystem, the broader assessment of which manufacturers are delivering high-quality and/or high-performance products must be left to the Helium Community and natural market forces. This puts a majority of the responsibility of “buyer beware” on the purchaser, which is unlike many other centralized network-connected products which are directly supported by the “network operator”.