Background

A large, international manufacturing firm approached us looking for novel ways to add a layer of data collection and analytics the their existing, purely mechanical warehouse and lifecycle management business processes.

Challenge​

Recovering data from benign, mechanical objects presents a unique challenge. With no existing electronics or API's to access, our task of retrieving data was not straightforward.

Solution​

RFID tags are a popular tool within the IoT community. By affixing these tags to objects, they can be associated with data models in a central server. With the help of a custom electronics engineering firm, a scanner was built which allowed RFID tags to be read and their data transmitted wirelessly via Bluetooth. Our team built a comprehensive suite of software for collecting object scans, tracking their locations, managing inventory and tracking movement geographically over time. A cross platform mobile app with Bluetooth interface capability was built and rapidly iterated on for several months. A single page, dashboard style web app allowed for admin control and real-time oversight of the virtual object network.

Results

After iterating through various ideas, our client brought our software and extensive documentation back in house and started a global production rollout of our integrated hardware & software solution.

Benefits

By working with Opna Dev, our client was able to overcome the bureaucratic inefficiencies that accompany large organizations. We provided a prototype in the first week and continued rapidly iterating on concepts that the team leaders wanted to explore. In the end, we helped generate numerous ideas and demonstrated their real-world potential through functional software prototypes.

Conclusion​

Opna Dev took a rough concept and turned it into a fully functioning prototype in several short months. Working with an internal team on site in San Francisco and distributed across Europe, we were able to provide products and documentation which allowed our client to move forward. Our work is set to be distributed internationally and will be serving the manufacturing industry for years to come.