Petcube - Pet Gadget
Hello everyone, my name is Alexander Neskin. I live in Kiev, work in the field of IT and am fond of robotics. In this post I will tell you how a rather innocent entertainment with Arduino turned into a promising project. Oh yes, all this is called Petcube - a robot that will allow your pets to forget about being alone and depressed while you are away.
I live with my girlfriend, and we also have a Rocky dog on a permanent set. Not so long ago we moved to a new apartment. Great place for start-up: high ceilings, large windows, maximum light. All would be well, but Rocky felt uncomfortable. In our presence, the dog still somehow restrained his anxiety, but as soon as we left for work, Rocky immediately began to crumble furniture and spoil the walls. But this is not the worst thing - the soundtrack for the neighbors was a long bark, which did not stop even for a minute. It got to the point that they wanted to call the police. I didn’t want to part with my beloved dog. It was urgent to save the situation.
At one point I remembered my "adult constructor." Mournful circumstances prompted me to finally assemble something practical on my favorite Arduino board. I connected a webcam to it, two servomotors for rotation and scotch tape a simple laser pointer - Rocky's favorite toy. Many animals, especially cats and dogs, are crazy about moving beams of light: sun bunnies or laser pointers. In order to watch Rocky outside the house, a web interface was created and simple control of the position of the camera and laser.
First prototype
Later he opened access to device management and shared the link with friends. This was the first success - friends liked to amuse themselves with Rocky, and the dog himself was pleased with his life like never before. It turned out that many friends have similar problems with bored pets, so they also wanted to have such a simple but effective device.
The first web-based gadget management interface
I am an IT specialist by vocation and education, so I clearly understood that I wanted to focus on the technical side of the project. Immediately began the search for like-minded people who would help with the visual component, as well as with the promotion and organization of the business.
Of course, in the world of things aesthetics and the notorious usability dominate. The second person on the team was Andrey Klen, a talented designer whom I worked with over the past years.
With the first prototype, I attended several conferences and received an exceptionally positive feedback. For example, at Hackers & Founders in Odessa, the project won in a small competition of business ideas. I came to Odessa with two friends from Prodigi (the agency where I work as a service station) - Valik Gritsenko and Yaroslav Azhnyuk. We talked about the idea of a joint project, new goals, free niches in the market and a big picture of the future, where the phenomenon of “ internet of things ” is rushing into . Yaroslav was about to leave his SMM Head position in Prodigi to start his own business, although he had not yet acquired a specific project. The idea of a robot for pets seemed to him an ideal option, and he soon joined the Petcube team as CEO.
We began to actively engage in the project in August. My mission is the product itself, and this is not only hardware and the server part, but also interfaces for the browser and mobile applications. Of course, many problems arise: even a plastic cube shell for a prototype in Ukraine is difficult to produce. Briefly from the latest achievements: we managed to make the second version of the prototype with the help of Artem Lutov, a top-tier Android developer and researcher, to work out a serious business plan, shoot a demo video for Kickstarter, successfully reject it and start shooting a new one.
Video from the filming of the video for Kickstarter
The main “milestone” so far can be considered successful participation in IDCEE. The Petcube booth has always had a crowd of people who claimed that our project was the most interesting and unusual at the entire event. Some simply approached to communicate and get to know each other, and ended up with all business proposals. So there was an understanding that we were on the right track.
Petcube Team
Second prototype
The second version of the web interface
The next point in the project should be Kickstarter, then raising the round of investment already overseas. We talked with many investors in Ukraine, got pleasant impressions and useful experience.
A quick reference: the US pet products market was $ 51 billion in 2011 and is growing at 2% per year. In the States, 62% of the population has pets, 20% of the owners of cats and dogs leave the TV on so that the animals are not bored during their absence. Today this problem is solved by live hired people who look after the pets. There are practically no high-tech and easy-to-use methods.
We are sociable and open to proposals for cooperation. We need people who, together with us, will make Petcube work in the most reliable way.
First of all, we are looking for technical specialists for the development of hardware & software, a circuit design guru and product designers.
I am sure that among the readers of Habr there are many people who find Petcube interesting. And if you want to become part of a project with a good meaning and a good, somewhat noble, mission, we will be glad to meet you. After all, many have pets, and each owner will say that his pets are not supposed to be sad. Write to info@petcube.net
upd: Thank you all, we are on the main page ! Due to the Habra effect, the images were not displayed for some time but they were already fixed. Added a screenshot of the second version of the web interface.
upd2: Found problems with the mailing address info@petcube.net, already fixed everything. If you wrote to us at this address - please send the same letter again. We received many requests through other channels, thanks to everyone who is interested, we will respond within 24 hours)
Idea
I live with my girlfriend, and we also have a Rocky dog on a permanent set. Not so long ago we moved to a new apartment. Great place for start-up: high ceilings, large windows, maximum light. All would be well, but Rocky felt uncomfortable. In our presence, the dog still somehow restrained his anxiety, but as soon as we left for work, Rocky immediately began to crumble furniture and spoil the walls. But this is not the worst thing - the soundtrack for the neighbors was a long bark, which did not stop even for a minute. It got to the point that they wanted to call the police. I didn’t want to part with my beloved dog. It was urgent to save the situation.
At one point I remembered my "adult constructor." Mournful circumstances prompted me to finally assemble something practical on my favorite Arduino board. I connected a webcam to it, two servomotors for rotation and scotch tape a simple laser pointer - Rocky's favorite toy. Many animals, especially cats and dogs, are crazy about moving beams of light: sun bunnies or laser pointers. In order to watch Rocky outside the house, a web interface was created and simple control of the position of the camera and laser.
First prototype
Later he opened access to device management and shared the link with friends. This was the first success - friends liked to amuse themselves with Rocky, and the dog himself was pleased with his life like never before. It turned out that many friends have similar problems with bored pets, so they also wanted to have such a simple but effective device.
The first web-based gadget management interface
Like-minded people
I am an IT specialist by vocation and education, so I clearly understood that I wanted to focus on the technical side of the project. Immediately began the search for like-minded people who would help with the visual component, as well as with the promotion and organization of the business.
Of course, in the world of things aesthetics and the notorious usability dominate. The second person on the team was Andrey Klen, a talented designer whom I worked with over the past years.
With the first prototype, I attended several conferences and received an exceptionally positive feedback. For example, at Hackers & Founders in Odessa, the project won in a small competition of business ideas. I came to Odessa with two friends from Prodigi (the agency where I work as a service station) - Valik Gritsenko and Yaroslav Azhnyuk. We talked about the idea of a joint project, new goals, free niches in the market and a big picture of the future, where the phenomenon of “ internet of things ” is rushing into . Yaroslav was about to leave his SMM Head position in Prodigi to start his own business, although he had not yet acquired a specific project. The idea of a robot for pets seemed to him an ideal option, and he soon joined the Petcube team as CEO.
Plans
We began to actively engage in the project in August. My mission is the product itself, and this is not only hardware and the server part, but also interfaces for the browser and mobile applications. Of course, many problems arise: even a plastic cube shell for a prototype in Ukraine is difficult to produce. Briefly from the latest achievements: we managed to make the second version of the prototype with the help of Artem Lutov, a top-tier Android developer and researcher, to work out a serious business plan, shoot a demo video for Kickstarter, successfully reject it and start shooting a new one.
Video from the filming of the video for Kickstarter
The main “milestone” so far can be considered successful participation in IDCEE. The Petcube booth has always had a crowd of people who claimed that our project was the most interesting and unusual at the entire event. Some simply approached to communicate and get to know each other, and ended up with all business proposals. So there was an understanding that we were on the right track.
Petcube Team
Second prototype
The second version of the web interface
The next point in the project should be Kickstarter, then raising the round of investment already overseas. We talked with many investors in Ukraine, got pleasant impressions and useful experience.
Prospects
A quick reference: the US pet products market was $ 51 billion in 2011 and is growing at 2% per year. In the States, 62% of the population has pets, 20% of the owners of cats and dogs leave the TV on so that the animals are not bored during their absence. Today this problem is solved by live hired people who look after the pets. There are practically no high-tech and easy-to-use methods.
We are sociable and open to proposals for cooperation. We need people who, together with us, will make Petcube work in the most reliable way.
First of all, we are looking for technical specialists for the development of hardware & software, a circuit design guru and product designers.
I am sure that among the readers of Habr there are many people who find Petcube interesting. And if you want to become part of a project with a good meaning and a good, somewhat noble, mission, we will be glad to meet you. After all, many have pets, and each owner will say that his pets are not supposed to be sad. Write to info@petcube.net
upd: Thank you all, we are on the main page ! Due to the Habra effect, the images were not displayed for some time but they were already fixed. Added a screenshot of the second version of the web interface.
upd2: Found problems with the mailing address info@petcube.net, already fixed everything. If you wrote to us at this address - please send the same letter again. We received many requests through other channels, thanks to everyone who is interested, we will respond within 24 hours)