This customer is a team of environmentally conscious engineers.
They are set on developing smart solutions to the current energy and emissions problems.
They are looking to use ground-breaking techniques to reduce wasted energy on cooling. Reducing overall global power requirements in the process.
They came to us for a proof-of-concept technological demonstrator. They had a measured and sensible approach to design; with a complete set of ideas and goals they were looking to achieve. The project was set out using a risk averse, prototype-driven strategy. This was a fantastic way to approach such a complicated system architecture, from the point of view of the electronics engineer on the project. This approach allowed for the risks to be minimised at each stage of development. The project has received backing from public funding due to its smart green focus.
The project was planned to be modular, which helps break down the design phases. This started with the core Minimum Demonstratable Product.
The first stage revolved around getting the support components for the system on chip, a Raspberry Pi CM4, designed-in effectively onto a carrier board, which broke out the required signals to a plug-in connector. We next built an evaluation board to mate with the computing module, and provide the access to the Raspberry Pi IO, including USB and Gigabit Ethernet. As well as everything required for booting and programming. As a design partner to Raspberry Pi we were well placed to work on this project.
We delivered a proven design which worked first time for both the plug-in board and the evaluation board giving the customer a tool which they could develop with.
The next iteration in their design plan, after the single evaluation board, was a multi-node back plane to prove the gigabit ethernet switching and internode connectivity. For this we utilised a set of ethernet switches. These were connected to form a multi-unit cluster.
The board featured all of the high power, high efficiency power supplies required and full USB connectivity. To allow debug and programming. It contained multiple management microcontrollers to control the low-level signalling. These boards were also designed to be stacked to form a larger configuration for their first demonstrator unit.
We hand-delivered them a proof-of-concept demonstrator which allows large scale processing and for the customer to further their ambitions to use energy as efficiently as possible and seek further funding.
At Ignys we strongly believe in Innovation with a Heart and we are very proud to be working alongside this strong team, who are actively impacting the environment in a positive way.
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