Smart Pebble
Elho's Smart Pebble is a device that you can use to easily monitor the well-being of any potted plant. The Pebble handles soil measurements with an Internet of Things approach to give the user feedback on their plant care. Designed for all plant lovers, from people who could use a little help keeping plants alive to those dedicated to creating the best environments for their plants.
User interacting with the pebble during setup
Final product with product
The pebble installed in a flower pot
Approach
Together with Frolic Studio, we designed this product with the following design goals in mind:
Simple to use
Aesthetically non-distracting
Long battery life
Low production cost
Our solution was a sensor module that periodically measures soil humidity, soil nutrient levels, and temperature. It then briefly connects to the user's Wi-Fi network and pushes the measurement data to the cloud. The user can use the companion app to get feedback on their plant care.
To make the battery last as long as possible, the device enters a very deep sleep state for 99% of the time. During this state, the whole unit uses less than 15 µA, resulting in a device that can last half a year on a small rechargeable LiPo battery.
The shape of a small pebble was chosen to make the device merge with its surroundings. The small size required a highly optimized PCB. To achieve this, the 2.4GHz Wi-Fi/Bluetooth antenna is integrated into the PCB itself. After careful antenna tuning and matching, the Pebble's embedded antenna significantly outperformed the reference modules we initially intended to use.
My responsibilities
This project was definitely a team effort with Frolic Studio and later also with Adapmi.
All industrial and interaction design was done by Frolic Studio. The electronic design was performed in close collaboration with Frolic Studio.
The Wi-Fi antenna design, PCB design, and verification were performed by me. All prototype firmware versions, including the pilot test firmware, were written by me.
After that, we approached Adapmi to create the product-ready firmware based on these firmware prototypes. Since Adapmi also made the companion app, this ensured a good match between the firmware and the app.
The Official Promotional Video of the Elho Smart Pebble
Video and Photograpy by Elho