I believe that building a product is like building your dream home. You take atmost care in laying out the essentials, chalking out the must-haves, drawing the blue print of the architecture, bricking the house to designing the interiors that makes a cozy home.
Similarly, at IONLAB, we have made sure Track Every Coin is on par with any internationally acclaimed consumer electronic goods and has features that cater to the needs of all of us. Despite the delays and little setbacks we have now been able to put two and two together. We present you the final prototype of our much anticipated hardware device – Track Every Coin, nicknamed TECI 
With the holiday season kicking in, this is normally the time you get to spend some time with your family reflecting on the good moments of 2009. We decided to retrospect and bring to you the highlights at Ionlab and the making of TrackEveryCoin, a project we have put our hearts and souls into.
January 2009: Prototype breadboards were converted to PCB designs
February 2009: Researched and begun sourcing components from various suppliers (LCD, Micro-controller, USB etc) from Singapore, China and India
March 2009: Changed LCD module to work at low voltage, Started talks with manufacturers, CAD designing, and completed Low level drivers for the hardware.
April 2009: New hardware version released (low power micro controller), Ported low level drivers for the new micro controller, Started design work on website.
May 2009: Sourcing of hardware components, Hardware design frozen for CAD designs, Trackeverycoin pre-launch website, www.ionlab.in website launched.
June 2009: Local source for LCD modules found, Identified manufacturing service, Base design for mobile application.
July 2009: PCB design for production complete, Placed production order for microcontroller and other components.
August 2009: Application software testing on production hardware, base version of CAD design ready. Website architecture design in place.
September 2009: PCB fabrication complete, received the first plastic prototype, testing different versions of mobile application.
October 2009: Identified packaging people, button sticker people, Microcontroller and other components arrives, second and third prototype of plastics arrives, Front end UI of website frozen, Mobile navigation simplified.
Noverber 2009: Application software bug fixes, Manufacturing plant software released, Desktop software (used to upload hardware data to website) is complete (testing in progress). Completed user manual for hardware.
December 2009: Integration of website backend and frontend started, Received the final prototype (shown above), we are tooling ready, Mobile application testing in progress, Desktop software released.
Next couple of milestones:
- Production of hardware
- Tooling of device and production
- Packaging
- Mobile application launch
- Alpha/beta testing of website
- Launch of hardware
Much appreciate your comments and feedback! A fantastic 2010 to all of you. Thank you for following our blog and cheering us thru 2009.
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Keep up the good work!
awesome. Our very best wishes
Pretty nice. Keep up the good work. Nice to see innovation…Finally
awesome work guys! eagerly awaiting the website launch
Great job! Keep up the same.. Look forward to the launch
@Pranathi: Thanks.
Hi, Great to see that you have built the product from scratch. But I feel that a mobile phone would track my expenses better. A basic java app. with data tfr using SMS would serve better. TECI will be just one more device for me to carry and maintain.
…Or am I missing something here?