Powering sleep quality with smart bed technology

How we introduced a brand new firmware design and adjustable climate feature for a major US bed retailer 

Our client’s backstory

Our client is a market leader in sleep innovation and bed manufacturing, powering the sleeping experience with smart bed technology designed to enhance the users' sleep and mental well-being.

Besides biometric data tracking and health monitoring options, the leading bed retailer introduced highly innovative features like adjustable bed temperature and mattress firmness to their products, further improving the sleeping experience and long-term health benefits.

With people having different sleep habits, the bed retailer wanted to cover multiple needs of each sleeper, like mattress firmness or temperature settings for each bedside. A climate-adjustable smart bed would allow couples to adjust the temperature individually, each to their preferences.

Once the idea was born, the company started to look for a partner that could deliver on the ambitious project with a multidisciplinary approach, and they decided to work with Klika’s expert teams, which had the needed expertise in firmware, hardware, and software to make the new edition a success. 

The challenges

Time to market was key as the company wanted to win the race in being the first to introduce the revolutionary feature in the competitive industry. The whole process required all teams involved to be up to speed and meet ambitious project deadlines.

On the other hand, new technology requirements and communication protocols required building a new scalable platform that supported the new features. Older hardware was not compatible with the new requirements, so it was decided to develop a new hardware and firmware platform to power climate control. A cost effective and efficient solution had to be set in place.

To fully utilize resources and be as efficient as possible, it was determined to develop the firmware and hardware designs simultaneously with Klika being in charge of the firmware design and the client’s team would work on the hardware at their own premise. Considering that we were a remote team in a different location and different time zone, we needed to figure out how we were going to synchronize and test integration of the two. Integration points had to be planned carefully along the way to ensure a 100% compatibility.

Klika solution

Working as a part of the client's team, we relied on Agile practices to produce fast and efficient results and to respond fast to requirements despite having a team in multiple locations.

First, we designed a flexible and scalable firmware architecture that could support the project. After gaining approval from all stakeholders, we produced lightweight and highly optimized embedded software that would use as few resources as possible and barely affect processing power and storage, which was one of the key goals. Our team had to work with great precision, as even a small mistake could render the whole experience useless.

To simulate the hardware environment, the firmware development team used market–available hardware evaluation modules combined with pre-defined sensors and actuators. This allowed firmware development to run in parallel with offsite hardware design almost independently.

Regular meetings were crucial to ensure hardware and firmware integration would succeed. A processor change was agreed upon to introduce new safety requirements. The team selected the real-time operating system for microcontrollers FreeRTOS, which supported a quick and efficient adjustment.

To support new functions and comfort requirements based on the feedback of the test group, we created a system for supporting over-the-cloud firmware updates for the dedicated application, which was running on an embedded Linux distribution created through the Yocto framework.

In parallel with the firmware, our team focused on developing tests and test automation systems, which helped detect bugs early in the process and ensure continuous integration testability. We used hardware-in-the-loop testing for firmware validation, oscilloscopes to verify analog and digital signal integrity, sniffers to verify communication protocols, and data acquisition tools to complete bus transfer data analysis. By introducing the automated test system, our client achieved faster development cycles and drastically reduced testing costs. The Klika team was the core development and quality assurance team that helped bring this new solution to life. 

Results

Klika has been working with the market-leading retailer for the past eight years. One of its most successful smart bed editions, with over 1 million accounts, was developed with Klika as the retailer's leading tech partner. Our relationship and trust grew over the years, and Klika now has 70+ people working on the smart bed technology.