How Voxela Used FixedIT.ai and AWS to Transform Caregiving
Voxela, a Silicon Valley-based technology company has developed VCare, a next-generation care solution service for nursing homes and assisted living facilities. With the help of FixedIT.ai, they managed to seamlessly integrate the Axis network cameras with Amazon Web Services' cloud offering to efficiently implement state-of-the-art algorithms and extensive integrations.
Providing Intelligent and Actionable Insights to Caregivers
Founded by serial entrepreneurs Yuta Endo, Goutham Kamath and Yusuke Yoshida, Voxela's mission is to transform the healthcare industry into a more responsive, patient-centric experience that makes incredible care available to everyone. Yuta (CEO) got the inspiration while interviewing caregivers for his aging grandparents.
VCare is an AI-powered system designed to detect falls and identify their root causes to help caregivers pinpoint and address the events that lead to mishaps. The solution can be installed in residents' own homes, private rooms, and common areas in congregate living settings such as assisted living or nursing home communities. Using computer vision algorithms it detects particular motions, such as fall or on the ground events, bed exits, etc. It later sends a notification to the designated caregiver's mobile device allowing staff to respond to the situation very quickly.
Creating a system that is easier to install than anything else on the market means that caregivers and facility managers can have it up and running without needing extensive technical support. This ensures that the system can be readily implemented in a variety of environments, from individual homes to larger community settings.
The Axis network cameras has traditionally been used by professionals in the video surveillance domain, where experienced integrators are used to install the system and bring-up the software. For Voxela, this was not an option, but despite this they wanted to build their system on the robust and very capable network cameras from Axis Communications. The choice fell on the discrete looking AXIS M1075-L Box Camera equipped with an AXIS TM1901 Wireless Kit. This in combination with intelligent software for easy configuration ensures a user-friendly installation process. This ultimately means more seniors can benefit from increased safety and caregivers can offer better, more responsive care.
With a lot of experience of software development in Amazon Web Services, the Voxela team knew that a tight integration between the camera and the cloud was the right way to go. To enable this, Voxela reached out to FixedIT Consulting where they have long experience of integrating edge applications in the Axis network cameras with different cloud providers. This collaboration ensured a smoother workflow for both their developers and their leadership team.
One of the challenges that Voxela experienced was cross compilation of the AWS IoT SDK libraries to make them compatible with the Axis cameras. For this, FixedIT's prebuilt libraries, tools and experience was invaluable to accelerate the development and let the Voxela team focus on what truly matters - enhancing caregiving through innovative technology.
Efficient utilization of the bandwidth is crucial in this type of applications, therefore it was natural for Voxela to add some intelligence to the Axis cameras. Although the Axis Camera Application Platform (ACAP) SDK is available directly from Axis Communications, collaborating with a strategic partner like FixedIT.ai is pivotal. They provide additional layers of value that enhance development efficiency and effectiveness, focusing specifically on edge application development for Axis network cameras.
Camera's have become sophisticated enough that we can now run state-of-the-art models on them without sacrificing accuracy. Running the model on the edge brings us scale at very low cost.
— Goutham Kamath, Co-founder/CTO at Voxela.ai
The experienced ACAP developers and Axis Certified Professionals at FixedIT Consulting quickly got Voxela up-to-speed by hosting tailored instructor-led workshops with their developers. The development was further simplified by Voxela using the FixedIT.ai build and development tools that FixedIT has created specifically to enhance ACAP development for the Axis cameras.
The workshops helped us to really figure out if the features we wanted to implement in ACAP were possible.
— Amruth Bhat, Lead Software Engineer at Voxela.ai
In practice, this injection of experience translated into practical enhancements in Voxela's product offering. For instance, the seamless integration between the edge application and the AWS IoT services allows operations to easily monitor the connected devices and ensure their functionality. Building this solution together with a team that has years of experience from edge applications in production and knows the history of the Axis SDKs makes for robust and future proof implementations. This will allow Voxela to continue to focus on research and development of AI-based care management that can lay the foundation for improved eldercare.
FixedIT's expertise was really helpful during development, as we could quickly get help from them in building our initial ACAP and implementing features in the right manner, saving us ton of time.
— Amruth Bhat, Lead Software Engineer at Voxela.ai
To achieve seamless integration with the cloud provider, they knew that they needed to use third-party libraries that were cross-compiled for the camera hardware. Camera systems not only face similar issues as smaller embedded systems, such as limited flash memory, but they also create an heterogeneous deployment environment with significant differences in hardware and software across various camera models.
This difficulty can tempt developers to create their own implementations, or refer to wrapping REST APIs, which often becomes a source of bugs and are expensive to maintain. This is something that FixedIT.ai has solved by offering precompiled libraries that they build and maintain specifically for the Axis network cameras and the AXIS OS. When using the FixedIT build tools, including a new library is only a few lines of configuration. If you need to add other libraries, using the FixedIT base image containing useful tools and scripts makes it easy to maintain.
The FixedIT CLI tool simplifies package development by automating common tasks and managing dependencies. It reduced manual setup and streamlined the development workflow, making the process more efficient.
— Nithin Kalla, Developer at Voxela.ai
Some of the things that FixedIT.ai provides to Voxela are:
The consultation services are provided through a Master Service Agreement, allowing Voxela to quickly adapt to new priorities or emerging challenges. Other services come with clear and straightforward quotations, simplifying the budgeting process.
Voxela’s VCare solution acts as a virtual caregiver, offering real-time alerts for falls and bed exits, monitoring daily activities, analyzing sleep & behavioral patterns, and delivering personalized care plans.
This solution has been successfully deployed in over 35 communities, making a significant impact in streamlining caregiving processes. To provide you with a glimpse of their impact, please see the LeadingAge Case Study.
They address the following pain-points to the caregiver in Senior Living and Hospitals:
You can find more at https://voxela.ai/ or by contacting them at info@voxela.ai.
If you too want FixedIT.ai as a trusted partner and a supplier of technology and knowledge, you can read more about their service offering at FixedIT.ai or contact them at info@fixedit.ai.
© 2024 FixedIT Consulting AB
VAT: SE559296849801
Org. Number: 559296-8498
Phone: +46 76 80 156 12
Email: Daniel.Falk.1@FixedIT.ai
