Smart devices

Software Engineering

Digital transformation through smart devices

With MaibornWolff at your side, you can make the most of the potential of smart devices. Our collaboration takes place at eye level: from the initial product vision to development and implementation through to support during go-live.

Our experts design a strategy tailored to your success and support you throughout the entire process. From joint workshops to ensuring smooth operations, we offer solutions that will drive your business forward. Within just a few weeks, we'll identify the best approach to help you reap the full benefits of smart devices and pioneering technologies.

book a free consultation

We offer solutions

Smart devices are connected to the internet and interact with their environment via sensors, are equipped with considerably more computing power and intelligence and receive new features via remote software updates. Software development for smart devices is changing dramatically and requires approaches that work across many disciplines.

How we achieve our goal

Smart devices are never just the device and its firmware. They are digitized physical products that are always an interplay of networked components: Device hardware, device software, device UI (HMI), IoT backend, data pipeline, mobile app, 3rd party API, etc. These must function as a whole and be secured so that they offer added value for the end user and become a high-quality product.

This is our key

To make the end-to-end concept for smart devices a reality, we start at the breaking points: these can be in areas such as connectivity to the IoT platform, IT security, remote software updates or the user experience. We help to close these gaps - with technological expertise and cross-team, communicative collaboration.

Processes and technologies: What smart devices change

If the device is networked and regularly receives new software updates, the V model with specifications and lengthy release cycles no longer makes sense. The end user expects much more frequent releases, as is usual in the cloud or on a smartphone.

A lot has also changed in terms of technology: Where previously highly specialized chips and operating systems adapted to the hardware had to be built, more and more smart devices are based on standard platforms such as the STM32 and embedded Linux. We are even already seeing containers based on Docker or Podman on some devices.

With the Smart Devices division, we are helping to master the digital transformation of these devices.

Our approach

It all starts with your product vision, which we illuminate together with you. In the second phase, we develop the software for your device before finally supporting the go-live.

Exploration

In workshops, we work with you to shed light on your product vision, design the architecture, the first minimum viable product, a feature roadmap or even a "model to be wrong". We start with a small team for three to eight weeks.

On the way to the smart device, it is crucial to map the development statuses in prototypes and to constantly compare them with the customer's expectations.

Implementation

We implement the software on the device, establish connectivity to the IoT backend and use the device's sensors to record its environment.

The procedure depends heavily on the results of the exploration phase. The following guidelines are recommended:

Develop the highest risk parts into a working iteration first.
Encapsulate high volatility components with appropriate APIs to allow independent development of dependent components.
Pick up well-defined components and re-implement them first to enable an iterative approach.

Hypercare

Once implemented, the team can be scaled down to support the go live. All prioritized features are complete and our team is focused on a smooth transition to production.

Our references & projects

A reference is worth more than 1,000 words. Fortunately, we have dozens of them. Click through a selection of our most exciting projects and see for yourself!

See all references

MAN: Efficient threat analysis for control units

Digitalization increases cyber risks - especially for MAN's new CM4 control unit. Our experts use the 4×6 methodology and ThreatSea to identify threats at an early stage and develop targeted protective measures. Find out how MAN uses intelligent risk analysis to strengthen the security of its vehicles.
Learn more

MAN: Efficient threat analysis for control units

7 months

Project duration

Over 20 workshops

Threat analyses

Over 500

Potential risks evaluated

Learn more