Kolkata-based TenPi Technologies aims to put India on the world hardware map
Kolkata-based Tenpi Technologies is an end-to-end IoT solutions company, with a large suite of products and services.
At a Glance
Startup: TenPi Technologies
Founder: Osama Raushan and Anil Shaw
Year it was founded: 2017
Where it is based: Kolkata
Sector: Hardware services
The problem it solves: Provides IoT based hardware solutions for its clients
Funding raised: Bootstrapped
The Indian startup ecosystem is largely software-driven, with little focus on hardware. Rising hardware imports, however, indicate that as a country, India needs to move towards creating opportunities in this sector, and increase its competence in areas like manufacturing, design, robotics, and Internet of Things (IoT).
BTech graduates Osama Raushan and Anil Shaw had realised early on that India lacked when it came to hardware development, but it took three years of working in a corporate setup for them to realise their calling to start up. Says 27-year-old Osama:
“We (India) were far behind when it came to electronic hardware. People/ companies who wanted to implement Internet of Things (IoT) faced challenges like a talent pool crunch, the unavailability of rapid prototyping instruments, and lack of subject matter expertise, whereas China was the hub of electronics hardware.”
He added that the inspiration for TenPi Technologies came from the observation that India was way behind China when it came to the development of a robust hardware sector.
As electronics engineers, the duo was passionate about developing electronic products, and in 2017, took the plunge to start TenPi Technologies.
What the company does is simple, but at the same time with far-reaching results. TenPi Technologies is an end-to-end IoT solutions company, with various products and services in that domain. It works on the mantra of co-innovation where it co-innovates with client in a unique lab-as-a-service model.
“We set up a dedicated lab, and started consulting for our clients. We offer rapid prototyping. As an IoT solutions provider, we want to make an impact across organisations, verticals, and industries – from manufacturing to realtime tracking, to retail marketing, to environment sensing.”
End-to-end solutions
Its engineering and development services are in the domains circuit design, printed circuit board design, embedded systems design, and mechanical enclosure design for hardware, while the software development includes firmware development, web/mobile application, cloud server integrations.
It also provides product engineering services for custom product development, and data visualisation and Machine Learning for predictive analysis.
“We have also developed a couple of in-house products, and are in the process of filing patents," says Osama. He adds the products include:
Air Quality Index (AQI): The company has designed and developed a portable air pollution detection device. It sends real-time data to the cloud and the mobile app/web app, which calculates the Air Quality Index.
Internet Remote: It can be used to trigger any action on the internet, from launching a rocket, to ordering a pizza. It’s a very small and portable device, the size of a two-rupee coin.
Retina movement sensing device: TenPi is working on an in-house product line which can sense/track retina movement. The use cases could be in virtual reality, advertising, healthcare and market research.
So far TenPi has serviced clients in the areas of healthcare, enterprise IoT solutions, and the wearable devices industry, and generated revenue of Rs 50 lakh. Products are customised according to client requirements and pricing also differs on this basis.
Before starting TenPi, Osama worked as a consultant in ITC Infotech where he got in-depth experience in handling clients, while his classmate Anil worked as an electronics research and development engineer at LG Electronics.
TenPi Technologies was incubated at the Nasscom 10,000 Startup Warehouse, and its team strength is 13 at the moment.
Market perspective
IoT has garnered a lot of attention of late, with every industry vertical weighing and leveraging IoT to increase efficiency, productivity, and to explore new business models moving from capital expenditure to operating expenditure and increasing revenue.
The biggest change has been in the components of IoT, like sensors, edge nodes, wireless connectivity, gateway, cloud infrastructure, and analytics. The sector is steadily gaining traction with more connected devices making their presence felt in every aspect of life.
The global IoT market was estimated at $5.96 billion in 2015, and is projected to reach $26.95 billion by 2020 at a compounded annual growth rate of 35.2 percent.
In the last five years, IoT startups have grabbed attention, and listing platform angel.co has listed over 3,000 global startups in this sector. According to CB Insights, a whopping $12.5 billion has been pumped into IoT startups worldwide over the last five years by the VC community.
In future, TenPi plans to set up a manufacturing unit to realise its full potential as an electronics system and design manufacturing company.
“A couple of things lined up for the company this year include a prototype run of environment sensing, early warning system solutions and expanding geographical locations, with our first offshore office in Singapore. We also plan to launch our open source platform to encourage the manufacturers’ community to TenPi. Apart from these, we are also working on developing our own product range and plan to come out with smart devices in healthcare, scheduled for a market launch by end of 2019,” says Osama.