Preparing for the launch of their M250 Stereax Battery, advanced materials development innovator Ilika wanted to demonstrate their perpetual beacon device using an Android tablet. With the requirement to show potential customers performance characteristics and an example use-case to prospects, Ilika needed to work with a developer who could handle both native mobile and embedded development work seamlessly. Luckily they contacted us!
Ilika demanded not only accurate and robust engineering, but also an application UI which looked as good as their technology performed. Airsource raised that bar with custom illustration to fit Ilika's corporate brand and colour palette.
We worked with Ilika’s engineering team to integrate with their prototype device, and customised the Nordic Semi Beacon nRF52 platform to communicate with the battery and monitoring peripheral. Working under extremely demanding battery life, time and bandwidth constraints, we designed a protocol layer on top of the BLE advertising mechanism that allowed the Ilika device to be inactive for as long as possible.
Integrating with the protocol, we then designed and built an Android application that could be run on a tablet or phone. The app allows the user to configure battery settings, log connections and performance, and display graphs of the device performance characteristics. Later we added full screen visual indicators for battery temperature. These are useful both for further product development and for customer demonstration purposes.
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