Executive summary Executive summary

Client background

AES Corporation is an industry leader that serves commercial security markets and government agencies with long-range wireless, private mesh radio alarm communication products, and services.

Business challenge

AES Corporation needed to prevent unexpected device boot failures and improve the quality of services they provided with their devices. Also, the client wanted to improve the performance of the MultiNet receiver and migrate it to a virtual machine.

N-iX approach

N-iX specialists have identified the problem that prevented devices from operating under certain conditions and fixed it in a short time frame. Our team conducted a Discovery Phase to understand the client’s business needs, elicit requirements, prepare detailed calculations, design a roadmap and suggest a tech stack.

Value delivered

The N-iX team has helped AES Corporation troubleshoot a problem with the device boot and reduce the number of reported issues. Together with the client, we prepared a detailed plan for the migration taking into account the latest technologies and industry best practices.

Location:
USA
Industry:
Utilities
Partnership period:
January 2020 - present
Services:
Embedded Software Development, Embedded Software and Hardware Testing
Expertise delivered:
Embedded C, Embedded Linux, Microcontrollers
Technologies:
C, C++, Bash Script, JavaScript, PHP, SQLite

Success story in detail

Business challenge: Improving reliability and availability of the system

AES Corporation specializes in the security sector. The company develops special AES subscribers — sets of devices that can be connected to the alarm system on customer premises. Once connected, the subscribers allow sending alarms from customer premises to the Central Monitoring Station.

The company engaged the N-iX team to eliminate device operation interruptions that occurred under certain circumstances with a root cause that was difficult to reproduce. Therefore, the client needed the experts who could identify the problem and fix it. The N-iX team provided reverse engineering services, which helped the client locate and solve the problem.

Also, the N-iX experts helped to maintain and enhance the MultiNet receiver — a device built to receive all alarm signals from the AES mesh network. The hardware of the receiver processes and sends all alarm data to the automation software of the central station. Subsequently, it was decided to migrate the software from a physical device to a virtual machine using the latest technologies and industry best practices.

N-iX approach: Discovery Phase for an upgraded wireless mesh radio alarm communication system

We started our cooperation with helping prevent unexpected device boot failures. Within a short time frame, the issue was eliminated. By the end of 2020, there was a team of 3 developers and 1 AQA working on the project related to subscribers. We used best practices to set up the test automation framework from scratch and introduce CI for automated test case execution.

After successfully completing the project, N-iX specialists started working on another client’s product — MultiNet receiver. Our client decided to migrate the MultiNet receiver from a physical device to a virtual machine. They requested a Discovery Phase to assess all the pros and cons and mitigate risks. We conducted a technical audit, provided an in-depth analysis, and gathered a team of reliable tech experts. Together with the client, we decided to build the next generation of the MultiNet receiver from scratch using C ++ and Java. A team of 8 IT specialists has been working on the project.

Implementation: System troubleshooting and the next generation of MultiNet receiver

Subscribers are embedded devices based on the Linux kernel. They are developed using C, PHP JavaScript, and SQLite. The N-iX team contributed to extending and improving the functionality. The main challenge was to fix the problem that prevented the device from turning on. After careful investigation, we found that the problem was in the bootloader configuration that conflicted with Linux configuration, which resulted in critical data being erased from the flash drive. This helped us troubleshoot the problem and make changes for end-users.

N-iX specialists built the test automation framework from scratch that covers the GUI, backend, and hardware parts of testing products. We set up CI for automation test case execution, added test cases automation reporting into the test management system, and automated 75% of the manual regression test plan for subscribers.

The MultiNet receiver is a Linux-based physical device with ethernet ports. It notifies dispatchers of the status of subscribers and receives alarm signals. The N-iX team helped improve it implemented new features such as real-time log monitoring with Web UI, as well as provided constant maintenance. Also, we've been working on the new solution's architecture to migrate it to a virtual machine.

What we have achieved together: Improved reliability of AES devices and accelerated time-to-market

Our team contributed to improving both subscribers (AES devices) and the MultiNet receiver. The N-iX team found and fixed a major issue with subscribers that caused unexpected device boot failures. We quickly expanded the team from 1 to 11 specialists. Also, we built the test automation framework from scratch and automated 75% of the manual regression test plan for subscribers. In addition, our experts started to build the next generation MultiNet receiver on a virtual machine.

Value delivered by N-iX: Increased customer satisfaction and improved performance of devices
  • Developed the solution for subscribers, reducing the number of reported issues by 92% and increasing the customer satisfaction level;
  • Conducted a Discovery Phase by performing a technical audit, providing detailed estimation of the team composition, and developing a roadmap for the migration of the MultiNet receiver's software from a physical device to a virtual machine;
  • Designed the next generation MultiNet receiver that will simplify and speed up system provisioning and improve availability, maintenance, and recovery.
Location:
USA
Industry:
Utilities
Partnership period:
January 2020 - present
Services:
Embedded Software Development, Embedded Software and Hardware Testing
Expertise delivered:
Embedded C, Embedded Linux, Microcontrollers
Technologies:
C, C++, Bash Script, JavaScript, PHP, SQLite
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