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Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

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Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#91

We make a camera system for construction sites. Using computer vision, we can identify when and for how long subcontractors show up as well as notify our customers of unwanted behavior on site. https://bedrockwireless.com/ Fun fact, we probably have the best port-o-potty detector in the world.

This is pretty neat. I'm wondering if something like this (on a smaller scale) could be used to catch the elusive illegal dumper in my neighborhood.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#92
Our company is developing affordable phased array antennas. The end goal is to serve the next-generation commercial wireless communications and sensing markets (e.g. 5G/6G, mmW imaging radar, etc), though as we're bootstrapped most of our work currently is in Defense.

On the very off chance there's other RF or antenna engineers out there, we're hiring (US remote)!

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#93
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The math is this: BOM + cost to acquire a customer + cost to sell the unit Otherwise you don't have a business. Please don't ask me how I know this. 10x is a rule of thumb, YMMV. You just need to make the above inequality evaluate to true. You can (maybe) raise money to deal with the various non-recurring expenses. Oh and you should pay your employees too.

:D I’d love to get your advice, can I contact you?

Dude, I'm just an engineer who can do basic arithmetic.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#94
post #52

We make tiny Linux servers packed with real devops tools (but also sporting a somewhat-easy-ish-to-use UI) for home-hosting and self-teaching: https://pibox.io - works great with Jellyfin!

Two big 'ole thumbs up for Kubesail and the Pibox! Been running mine since November of 2022 and it's great. As a complete novice I was able to self-host Jellyfin, Bitwarden, Nextcloud, Resilio Sync, and Flatnotes pretty much all in a few minutes. The Pibox is great, and the folks at Kubesail are wonderful.

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, in the housing industry, it is generally job bid instead. The contractor taking longer just means they get paid later and don't get as many jobs done. Also, Unions hate this right?

It's less about tracking how long they're there and more about when they showed up. We do the former because we can, but the GC really wants to know if and when their subs are showing up without having to be on site 24/7 waiting for them. For example, they can look back through yesterdays events to see that their plumber showed up - and then they'll know they need to go check on the work. The alternative is trying to…

That's an interesting angle. My Father actually, by chance, owns a residential drywall and finishing business. The 'did the plumber show up' factor is key. Though I'm not sure why this couldn't be solved by having the subs of a builder agree to give basic job updates. How do residential customers feel about someone's camera watching their house?

Re: Ask HN: Any hardware startups here?

#98
post #9

We make a system for assisting self-evacuation from tunnels using directional sound effects: https://norphonic.com/products/evacsound/ Most of the userspace work including the planner, fire detection, resource scheduling and distributed execution is done in Common Lisp.

uhm, I need to introduce you to someone, who has developed this into a patented delivery via a baseball cap (hat) bill with directional indicators via LED to give you wayfinding HUD without a screen....

There's been lots of such ideas floating (and patented). But no evacuation method that relies on a motorist having any device or app on them is feasible.
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