Multimedia — Portable multimedia devices continue to emerge in the marketplace. EQware has the experience to harness the performance and low power capabilities you will need to create a winning product, whether you need special hardware, OS, device driver, or codec support.

Networking — In a world where almost every electronic device can interconnect, networking and security skills are paramount. The IoT has taken the consumer world by storm. Access points, special hardware, high performance device drivers, and protocol stacks are all part of a day's work for EQware.

Wireless — EQware engineers have experience with a variety of wireless projects, from FM subcarriers to the latest in low power wireless. Our solid background with established wireless standards such as IEEE 802.11 (WiFi), Bluetooth, BLE, and cellular technologies has allowed us to forge ahead with custom uni- and bi-directional RF protocols, spanning the spectrum. We have engineered many advanced features like frequency-agility, forward-error correction, and time-division multiplexing for substantial savings in bandwidth usage and battery life. EQware knows this tricky ground and can guide your project safely across.

Quality Assurance — EQ stands for Embedded Quality, and it's no idle boast. EQware has extensive experience with QA, spanning decades. We have built custom test systems able to conduct completely automated regression test suites that ran for days, RF manufacturing testers, and test systems that use cameras to evaluate the content of LCD displays. There is an inherent risk in having the same team that designed a new product be responsible for testing it as well; they are too likely to overlook the same issues they overlooked in design. Whether you want someone to build custom test tools or provide that essential outside viewpoint, EQware has the skills you need.

Stand-alone Embedded — Some our most impressive projects have run stand-alone, with no underlying OS support at all. For maximum performance and flexibility and minimum code footprint, there's nothing like crafting your own. Whether your code has to run off-disk, out of memory technology devices, or from mask-programmed ROM, we can provide the level of quality needed to make sure such projects succeed.

Product Specifications — Working from your ideas, we provide engineering requirements and specifications for your engineers. We have the ability to work directly with your marketing and sales people to create the documentation needed for engineering to begin work.

Proofs of Concept — During the early phase of product development, there can be engineering questions about the feasibility of certain requirements. We can create limited prototypes, ‘probe code’ (early firmware to test feasibility prototypes), and/or example applications. All these can ensure that your product development does not run into expensive hiccups later down the road.

Iterative Development — When the engineering requirements and specifications are clear enough, design and implementation for your product begins. We support building hardware prototypes and developing alpha release software and hardware for your marketing and sales force review. Then through an iterative process, specifications can be updated, designs adjusted and new alpha samples created.

Quality Assurance — At the point when you feel that the product is on course, the final phases begin, including alpha and beta releases. We support developer testing of all aspects of the product and create special test tools as needed. EQware can also support formal quality assurance and create test specifications, test suites, testing and test reports. This can be an iterative process to refine and debug the product to the point where it is production-ready.

Product Technical Support — EQware creates production tools, POSTs, technical documents, and assembly/test procedures when your project is ready for production. Once on the market, EQware can support you by creating firmware updaters and processes to ensure the products remain bug-free and fully featured, well as providing needed servicing tools and technical repair documents.

Complete Solutions — Look to EQware for the complete package: end-to-end embedded hardware and software design and implementation. Our engineers can start with your requirements and carry your project through every stage of specification, design implementation, and testing. At the end you will have a working, tested solution crafted to achieve your goals. We can even work with your application developers to make sure that all aspects of your product's feel and function meet your most exacting standards.

Application Development — Knowing how to use the Android Studio and Xcode IDEs effectively, and reference the plethora of features, APIs and examples in the respective SDKs for Android and iOS are minimal requirements for any application development. Having the development platforms ready to go, and lots of devices to test against is also important. EQware has the knowledgeable engineers and development resources to get your mobile app on the market quickly. Being embedded folks, we are well-versed in connecting a mobile app with your product and the cloud, typically via wireless interfaces, and understand the performance requirements of real-time features, such as audio-video streaming.

Portability — Portability is one of the most critical aspects of mobile development and one of the most difficult when integrating an app with embedded hardware. Each mobile OS and each device manufacturer is a little different. Even something as simple as streaming audio can become a challenge. EQware is up to that challenge; we have written code to run on all the most used Android and iOS devices.

Performance — Some of EQware's proudest mobile work has been in squeezing maximum performance from hardware and protocols while still maintaining robustness. Whether you want the highest bandwidth possible or your top priority is timing and precision, we have you covered.

Connectivity — It is vital to select the best route to connect the embedded hardware to the mobile app. EQware has expertise with WiFi, Bluetooth, BLE, and NFC, and can connect your devices across the internet, allowing them to send data to the cloud, becoming part of the IoT.

Toolchain Extensions — If your IC extends the instruction set of a standard CPU, or if you are making a completely new CPU, you will need toolchain support. We have added hundreds of new instructions and completely new instruction sets—including vector instructions—to the GNU and LLVM toolchains. From custom cross-compilers to assemblers, linkers and debuggers, we can build the tools you need to take advantage of your powerful new architecture.

Debuggers — A debugger is a critical piece of any toolchain, increasing productivity by an order of magnitude. Our engineers have worked under the hood with GDB, and we've ported debug agents to non-standard architectures, emulators, and custom runtimes.

Custom Test Tools — Nearly every embedded project needs to have a few custom tools built along the way: tools to stimulate your design, put it through its paces, and record its performance. Such utilities can be invaluable, both in the debug and test stages. Frequently, there is also a need for special production and servicing test tools. EQware engineers build these tools as a matter of course and deliver them as a part of the package.

System Simulators — EQware knows how to check the feasibility of large and small systems alike. Whether simulating and testing a new algorithm prior to implementation, or creating a discrete event simulation of a complex system with many variables, we know the tools and techniques for the job.

Hardware Emulation — Hardware emulation greatly assists in development of new hardware, systems, and software. It is a very cost-effective prototyping method, giving the initial software developers a controlled environment. Our engineers have built completely custom emulators, ported existing emulators, and combined multiple open-source emulators together to simulate a complete system.

Device Drivers — Device drivers are modules that interface between application-level software and your hardware. They typically run at kernel level, giving them special powers to fulfill their unique roles, but possessing special limitations as well. Their performance is often the key to a product meeting its requirements. Our engineers have created, ported and optimized numerous device drivers for many popular OSs, and for nearly every category of device.

Kernel Modifications — Not every firm is prepared to make changes inside the OS kernel, but when projects require it, EQware is up to that challenge. We also have the tools and experience needed to debug, analyze performance, and run regression suites against your kernel code.

BIOS/Bootloaders — Early in the boot cycle of every computer, special start-up code is executed which configures key devices, bringing up enough of the hardware so that the OS can be successfully launched. This is the bootloader, or as it's often called on workstation-class platforms, the BIOS. Bootloaders can be difficult to create, modify, and debug, but with EQware on your team, your project will soon be up and running.

RTOSs — EQware can provide the real time behavior needed by your product. Whether using a full OS such as embedded Linux, a small off-the-shelf, or custom OS, we can ensure that your system responds to interrupts and handles critical operations in a timely fashion.

Custom Runtimes — Sometimes no OS or runtime exists which fits your technical or licensing requirements. Instead of settling for a lesser runtime solution, contact EQware. We have ported and enhanced libc, libc++, pthread, OpenMP, and MPI libraries for custom environments. We also have experience in creating runtimes from the ground up.

Middleware Libraries — Today's embedded systems consist of multiple layers of software required to support your product application. These middleware layers can have critical functionality to support complex communication stacks, high performance multimedia, general accessibility, and more.

Evaluation Boards — EQware can take your new component and build a complete board around it, with all of the interfaces needed to help your H/W team test and validate their design.

‘Probe’ Code — This is the initial standalone code, often written in mixed C and assembly language, that can be used to prove your hardware's functionality. EQware engineers will work closely with your H/W team to make sure your design works the way it is supposed to. Probe code can then be passed on to serve as an example for subsequent board-support package development.

Testing and Reporting — Meaningful tests and reporting keeps your H/W team moving forward, and regression testing will ensure your design starts clean and stays clean through the entire development cycle. In the case of a new CPU, we can evaluate your instruction pipeline for stalls and faults, turning this information around to create a better compiler.

Reference Boards — EQware can design a complete reference board, help you choose appropriate peripherals, and produce all of the documentation an OEM will need to manufacture it.

Reference OS — EQware has experience with many OSs. We are proven experts at porting onto new reference boards, from kernel modifications to all of the device drivers needed to demonstrate your new hardware's functionality to potential OEMs.

Sample Applications — If your reference board needs a sample application to show it off properly, EQware has experience here as well, especially in the areas of streaming audio and video, codecs, wireless networking and memory technology devices.

Development Tools — EQware is highly proficient at creating and extending development tools. We have extended both GCC and LLVM compilers, ported debuggers, created custom test tools, and much more. Put our development tool services to work for you.