You are about to send your product concept to a manufacturer on the other side of the world. Here is exactly what we sign, what it covers, and how far down the supply chain it travels.
Yes — we sign an NDA before any technical discussion of your product. Ask in your first email, and a signed mutual non-disclosure agreement normally comes back within one business day. You do not have to describe the product to request one.
We sign your template if you have one. If a clause needs review before we can sign, we tell you which one on the same day rather than going quiet. If you don't have a template, we send a one-page mutual NDA in English that you are free to amend. There is no charge, and no obligation to place an order afterwards.
Most of the confidentiality questions we receive come from the same kind of enquiry: a founder or a small brand team developing a proprietary consumer product — a moulded silicone personal-care item, a wellness accessory, a piece of consumer hardware — who needs a partner for engineering, tooling, production, private labelling and packaging all at once.
That person is not asking a legal question. They are asking three practical ones:
The rest of this page answers those three, in that order. If you want the wider view of protecting a design when importing, read our guide on how to protect your design when ordering from China.
The agreement is mutual — it binds both sides — and treats the following as confidential information from the moment it is disclosed:
| Category | What that means in a real project |
|---|---|
| Product concept | The idea itself, the intended market, launch timing, product name and positioning before launch |
| Design & engineering data | Hand sketches, 3D CAD and STEP files, 2D drawings, tolerances, mould design, cavity layout, gate and parting-line decisions, DFM feedback we produce for you |
| Material & process specification | Silicone grade and Shore hardness, colour and pigment matching, gel or filler specification, surface finish and texture recipe, curing and post-cure parameters chosen for your part |
| Brand assets | Logo files, a logo moulded into the product, Pantone references, gift box and storage case design, printed inserts, label artwork |
| Commercial data | Quantities and forecasts, your pricing, negotiated MOQ, delivery schedule, your distributors and customer names |
| Product roadmap | Follow-on items and matching accessories you intend to add later — often the most sensitive part of the conversation |
Every workable NDA has carve-outs, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest. Information is not confidential if it is already public, was already known to us without an obligation of confidence, is independently developed without reference to your disclosure, or must be disclosed by law. One more exclusion matters in manufacturing: general process know-how stays general. How to run a compression press, how to polish a cavity or how to hold a tolerance is our trade — but that know-how never carries your geometry, your formulation or your artwork into anyone else's project.
Confidentiality is worth little if the file is protected at step one and passed around freely at step four. Information moves on a strict need-to-know basis, and each stage adds only the people who cannot do the work without it:
| Stage | What you send | Who can see it |
|---|---|---|
| 1. First enquiry | Product category, rough size, target quantity, material family — no files needed | Your project manager only |
| 2. NDA signed | Your template, or ours. Signed PDF returned, typically within 1 business day | — |
| 3. Technical review & DFM | Sketches, CAD, reference samples, requirements list | + our in-house engineer |
| 4. Quotation & tooling estimate | Full specification, tolerances, finish, colour | + one selected manufacturing partner, under a back-to-back NDA |
| 5. Prototype & mould build | Mould design, brand files for moulded-in logo | + the tooling shop building your cavity |
| 6. Production & packaging | Packaging artwork, inserts, carton marking | + the packaging supplier, also under NDA |
Your commercial terms — pricing, forecasts, distributor names — stay with us and are never passed to a production partner.
We should be straightforward about the structure, because it is the part most suppliers blur. EKINSUN is your single point of contact: requirements analysis, engineering and CAD, DFM, project management, quality control and export delivery are ours. The physical production runs at qualified manufacturing partners we have selected and worked with over years — a moulding partner, a tooling shop, a packaging supplier.
That is a normal and, done properly, a better structure: it means your product goes to the workshop actually best suited to it rather than to whichever machines one factory happens to own. But it only works if confidentiality travels with the file. So:
More on how we work as a project partner rather than a single factory is on our about page and the OEM/ODM programme.
For a custom-moulded product, the confidentiality question people mean is usually a tooling question. Put plainly:
| Asset | Owner | What will not happen to it |
|---|---|---|
| Mould or tool you paid for | You, on full payment of the tooling invoice | Not run for another customer, not modified for another buyer, not sold or transferred |
| Your CAD, drawings and DFM files | You | Not shared outside the signed chain, not reused as the basis of another customer's design |
| Your logo, colours and packaging artwork | You | Not applied to any other product, in any market |
| Prototypes and samples of your product | You | Not shown to other clients, not displayed at trade shows, not kept as a sales sample |
| General process know-how (machine settings, standard practice) | EKINSUN / partner | Stays generic — never includes your geometry, formulation or branding |
Being straight about this matters more than a reassuring sentence. Your mould does not sit in a vault at our office — it sits on the floor of the partner workshop that runs it, because that is where it has to be to make parts. Ask and we will tell you which facility holds it. What protects you is not the location, it is what is written down before the steel is cut:
Ask for it in writing before the deposit. If tooling ownership, the release condition and the storage period are not stated in the quotation you receive — from us or from anyone else — get them in writing before you pay the tooling deposit. It is far harder to negotiate after the steel is cut, and a supplier who will not put it in writing is telling you something.
This is the clause unlaunched brands care about most. It is worth separating what we control outright from what we impose on others, because only one of those two can honestly be called a guarantee.
These are entirely within our control, so we commit to them without qualification:
Everything shown in our case gallery is either our own generic work or published with the customer's consent. If you ever want a joint case study, that is a separate conversation and always your call.
No agent and no factory can truthfully promise that a third party will never misbehave. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you a feeling. What can be done is to remove the incentive, limit the exposure and agree in advance what happens if it goes wrong:
If it happens anyway. We pursue the takedown at our cost; we give you the evidence and the identity of the party responsible so that you can act on it yourself; and we move your tooling and your production to a different partner. You are not asked to absorb the loss quietly, and you are not left guessing who did it.
Skin-contact and personal-care products stand or fall on documentation, and buyers reasonably want to see it before committing. Certification and test documentation can be arranged for your project according to its requirements — ISO 9001 and ISO 13485 quality systems, biocompatibility testing to ISO 10993, FDA skin-contact and food-contact statements, LFGB reports, and RoHS/REACH declarations — provided by manufacturing partners holding the relevant approvals, with material certificates and test reports issued per batch where required.
During early evaluation, partner-identifying details on those documents may be redacted while confidentiality is established in both directions; complete records follow at formal order or for a regulatory submission. Details of what is available are on our certifications page, and the moulding side is described under medical-grade injection moulding.
An NDA is a real deterrent and a real contract, but it is one layer, not a force field. Two things are worth knowing before you rely on it:
Jurisdiction decides whether it bites. An agreement enforceable only in your home court is of limited practical use against a Chinese entity; a confidentiality agreement governed by Chinese law with jurisdiction in China is generally the more enforceable arrangement. We will sign under terms you propose either way, and we would rather you sign the version that actually works than the version that merely feels safe.
Disclosure discipline matters more than paperwork. Send what is needed for the stage you are at. A quotation rarely needs your full assembly, your formulation and your launch plan on day one. Staged disclosure, a partner you have checked, and IP registered where you actually sell are what make the NDA worth having. All four layers are covered in our design-protection guide.
Early-stage brands usually also want to know about low minimum order quantities and low-volume production before tooling, and vacuum casting is often the cheaper way to get 10–100 realistic units in hand before committing to a steel mould.
Yes. We sign a mutual NDA before you send any drawing, CAD file, sample or brand asset. Ask in your first email and the signed PDF normally comes back within one business day. You don't need to describe the product to request one.
Yes — customer and law-firm templates are signed as a matter of routine. If you don't have one, we provide a one-page mutual NDA in English that you are free to have reviewed or amended.
Yes. Each partner that touches your project signs a back-to-back agreement with obligations no weaker than ours, and receives only what its scope requires — the tooling shop sees the mould design, the packaging supplier sees artwork, neither sees your commercial terms.
You do. Ownership transfers when the tooling invoice is paid in full, stated in the quotation with your project number. It is not run for any other customer, not modified for another buyer, and not sold or transferred. It ships to you or to another manufacturer whenever you ask, provided there is no unpaid balance on the programme — that is the most common reason moulds get held anywhere in this industry, so we state the condition up front rather than let it surface later.
At the partner workshop that runs it — that is where it has to be to make parts. Ask and we will tell you which facility holds it. The tool is marked with your project number rather than a supplier name, and the storage period, maintenance responsibility and shot rating go into the quotation. We notify you before any tool is scrapped.
Not on any channel we control — that part is unconditional: no website, portfolio, social media, trade-show stand or marketplace account we operate, with no expiry unless you lift it in writing. At partner facilities the same ban is contractual and backed by controls: partner paperwork carries your project number rather than your brand, artwork is released only to the stage that needs it, and branded samples and rejects are counted and returned or destroyed. If a listing appears anyway, we pursue takedown at our cost, hand you the evidence and the identity of whoever did it, and move your tooling and production elsewhere.
No. An NDA is optional and many enquiries are quoted without one. We recommend having it in place before you send full CAD, mould design, formulation details or brand artwork.
Yes. Material certificates, ISO 10993 biocompatibility reports, FDA skin- or food-contact statements, LFGB reports and RoHS/REACH declarations can be supplied for your project. Partner-identifying details may be redacted during early evaluation; complete documentation follows at formal order or for regulatory submission.
Yes. Logo files, a logo moulded into the product, Pantone matching, gift box and storage case design and printed inserts are confidential on the same terms as engineering data.
An agreement enforceable only in your home court has limited practical value against a Chinese entity; one governed by Chinese law with jurisdiction in China is generally more enforceable. We sign under the terms you propose, and treat the NDA as one layer alongside staged disclosure, partner selection and registering IP where you sell.
This page describes how we handle confidential information commercially. It is not legal advice, and it does not replace the signed agreement — the executed NDA and your purchase contract govern. See also our terms and privacy policy.
No project details needed. Tell us the product category and we'll send a signed mutual NDA — usually within one business day, at no cost.
// Before you send files
Mutual NDA · Signed in 1 business day · No cost