The Power of the Platform

First of all let me say that for all 3 of you that follow my blog, I am sorry for the gap since my last post. I have been largely occupied as of late with activities surrounding our latest funding round as well as handling a couple of new opportunities that are of a sort that only I can deal with. These fall in the category of "platform sales" or sometimes "private label" opportunities and my experiences with these have inspired this blog post.

One thing about the EcoView EMS product that few people know or appreciate is that it is built on top of a telemetry platform that was originally architected and developed ahead of any real product concepts such as EcoView. My original vision was to develop a platform that could support a wide range of telemetry applications and featured a local touchscreen user interface that doubled as the telemetry gateway device. The server system middleware was designed to support any remote monitoring and control application and as a result has very few intrinsic data types and no expectations in terms of the types of devices that could be controlled and monitored.

A tremendous amount of work has gone into the core platform, internally known as the TAF (Telemetry Application Framework) over the past 7 years and it has evolved along with the needs of applications such as the GE Ecodashboard, the Breezeplay residential energy management product and, most recently, our own branded energy management product known as EcoView. In fact, many more development hours have gone into the TAF than have gone into any of the application variants - including EcoView. This may be surprising to some, seeing as how EcoView is our primary product and the focus of our marketing efforts.Products such as EcoView, however, represent the thinnest possible layer on top of the TAF technology stack. Moving forward, we are looking to extend our market reach by pursuing many other vertical applications that the TAF is ideally suited for. Examples include back-up generators, refrigeration equipment and pumping systems. Unitary equipment such as this would benefit greatly from the ability to remotely collect runtime data, generate alarms and provide real-time remote monitoring and control. The touchscreen UI is also of value since a laptop is ordinarily required to interface with machines of this sort and a permanent, full-color display would add convenience for local operators.As we head towards 2011 the emphasis on new vertical applications for the TAF will gain greater importance as well as focus for the company overal. Expect to see web site adjustments and marketing efforts aimed at exploiting the platform technology that, for today, lies hidden underneath of the EcoView EMS product line.