> If you want to minimize warranty expenses in order to maintain anything resembling profit, then you need to engineer you product so that the average useful life is well beyond your warranty period.

Or the flip side, if you want to go that way. Higher reliability allows you to offer a longer warranty, attracting either higher prices or more customers.

This is part of how Japan made themselves mainstream car sellers in the US. They calculated that the cars had to be more reliable, because in the early days without a lot of infrastructure, recalls would be very expensive. So they made the cars reliable. Allowing them to offer longer warranties.

I just bought a two year old Toyota, after driving a Honda that I bought new for 25 years.