HVAC Smart Controller

Client's Overview:

Leading air conditioning and commercial refrigeration company, with an integrated business model of a manufacturer, contractor and after-sales service provider, offering end-to-end solutions to customers, which is proven to be a significant differentiator in the market.

Challenges:

The client was looking to add innovative features to their air conditioning products. Their primary goal was to keep up with the ever-changing products in the market and change their existing product-user interaction scenarios.

Solution & Approach:

To address the challenges, the need was to upgrade the existing smart HVAC controller solution, focusing on the overall product cost target, thus enabling the client to compete with the international brands present in the marketplace.

The smart HVAC controller solution was upgraded to include a low-cost module for connectivity to the existing HVAC controller, which will provide remote monitoring and control of the HVAC controllers.

The module was designed to connect with an HVAC controller using a serial port and also WI-FI connectivity to connect to a local router
Online upload of HVAC data to the cloud-based server was configured along with the development of fault-predicting algorithms
Alerts were set up to trigger automatic e-mails and text messages from the server to pre-configured recipients
A mobile application with an intuitive and modern UI was developed

Results

The delivered low-cost solution ensured technology upgradation by integrating current and emerging technologies, thus resulting in an implementation of a smart controller which could be made applicable for the client’s diverse HVAC product family, thus providing –

Ability to compete with international HVAC smart solutions and at the targeted product price in the desired market
A user-friendly and competitive remote-control solution with a dedicated embedded system
Accessibility, monitoring and controlling from local and remote locations
An improved User Interface
New and drastically improved servicing efficiency
Constantly updated performance data for a better algorithm
Complete fault prevention and preventive maintenance

Outcome:

The solution with an upgraded HVAC controller having a remote monitoring module has been deployed in the field and has been running successfully for the last 5 years.

Technology Areas

HVAC Control Retrofit Add-on
Machine Connectivity
IoT/IoE
Remote Monitoring and Control
Fault Prevention and Analysis
Mobile Apps

Hardware

Single board module – Double-sided PTH
Schematics, BOM, Layouts and Gerbers: PADS from Mentor Graphics

Firmware

Code in C

Software

C#
.Net Framework 4
SQL Server

Mobile

AngularJS on Cordova framework for Smartphones

Cloud

Azure Cloud