Previous Client Impacts – High Impact Services, Inc.

10x Better Accuracy / Complete Flexibility

13 January 202028 June 2019 by Sean

We developed a hardware and software solution 10x more accurate than they were expecting. They required that we just get the target somewhere on the ROSAM’s display screen. Using algorithms of our own design, we got the target in the center of the crosshairs!

Trimming Resources saves $1M

25 November 201910 May 2013 by Sean

The team needed a microcontroller with more memory. Since this was a very high-volume product, moving to a more expensive microcontroller was going to cost $1,000,000+ over the three-year production life-cycle.

Premature Detonation Avoided

9 December 20199 May 2013 by Sean

While performing a Software Safety Analysis for a Radio-Frequency-Initiated Detonator, we analyzed the hardware/software interface. We decided to go “outside the box” and analyze the circuitry which insured the microprocessor would come out of power-up reset correctly … turns out– it didn’t reset properly! The processor could therefore operate erratically, which could initiate an unexpected detonation!

Checksum proves itself Critical

25 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

On the TLDHS project for the USMC, we urged the Program to include a checksum on critical target location data stored in the system’s database. Although the software developers didn’t want the extra work, our arguments prevailed.

Optimizing Safety Tests Saves $

25 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

The TLDHS Safety Tests had grown to over 100 pages of procedures. Understanding the software architecture led us to believe that some of these tests may be redundant.

We decided to thoroughly examine the code and uncovered many places in which different tests exercised the exact same code, using the same parameters and state information. We re-wrote the Safety Tests to remove all these redundancies.

Persistence in Troubleshooting Pays Off

25 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

On a software development project, our client asked us to debug a problem in another area of the code. As we began our troubleshooting, the issue began to look more and more like an electronics hardware issue, not a software issue.

85% Execution Time Improvement

14 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

While developing software for an appliance controller, we noticed poor, erratic performance in early tests. Although outside the scope of our initial tasking, we discovered very inefficient Interrupt Service Routines (ISRs).

Awarded “Best Contributor”

8 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

We were tasked with performing detailed Software testing and analysis of a safety-critical medical diagnostic device. As we investigated the code we discovered:

Unbounded recursion through 8 levels of calls in an error detection / reporting routine
Critical data which could be corrupted when Interrupt Service Routines (ISRs) ran at specific relative times
Execution times for critical ISRs which were much longer than the designers intended
Dozens of other potential problems of varying severity

Fast Fix for Huge Safety Change

19 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

The USMC changed the definition of “Troops in Contact“, a critical feature of the Software Safety design for the TLDHS. Removing all the places this data was referenced throughout the software would take many 100s of man-hours. It could also comprise the software, and thus would require extensive testing.

Immediate Safety Board Approval

25 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

NSWC Crane needed a Software Safety Analysis on a detonation device and a subsequent presentation to both the Navy’s System Software Safety Technical Review Panel (SSSTRP) and the equivalent Army Safety board.

$100Ks Saved by Clarifying Reliability Goals

25 November 20199 May 2013 by Sean

We were tasked to provide Safety Support for the Marine Corps GBOSS project. The Logistics team was required to insure that our product had a Mean-Time-Between-Failure (MTBF) below a certain threshold. They used statistics to show that we would need to conduct 1000s of hours of testing. Since this was a complex and expensive system, this approach was going to require extending the schedule and adding $100,000s to the project cost.

Training Cost Reduced 95%

8 November 20198 May 2013 by Sean

One of our clients asked for a 30-minute e-Learning course, which they needed done right away and would have cost on the order of $50,000 to develop. Instead of just saying “Yes, sir – we can do that!” we took the time to explore the “Why’s” of the project.

Critical Additions to Medical Device Standard

25 November 20198 May 2013 by Sean

We were invited to help develop a new Technical Information Report (TIR) for the Association for the Advancement of Medical Instrumentation (AAMI), a standards organization. This report, TIR 32:2004, discussed Medical Device Software Risk Management.

Test Strategy boosts Medical Device

14 November 20198 May 2013 by Sean

We directed a medical device manufacturer away from low-impact software testing activities to those with a high return on their efforts.

Although not in our original scope, we decided to take a detailed look at the Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) they were depending on. We discovered many potential issues with the RTOS, and steered them to a safer utilization.

Previous Projects

19 November 20197 May 2013 by Sean

Previous project experience includes project management, design, development, testing, and/or analysis of software. The following table lists many of the projects we’ve had an impact on … read more

Embedded Systems Software / Safety

10x Better Accuracy / Complete Flexibility

Trimming Resources saves $1M

Premature Detonation Avoided

Checksum proves itself Critical

Optimizing Safety Tests Saves $

Persistence in Troubleshooting Pays Off

85% Execution Time Improvement

Awarded “Best Contributor”

Fast Fix for Huge Safety Change

Immediate Safety Board Approval

$100Ks Saved by Clarifying Reliability Goals

Training Cost Reduced 95%

Critical Additions to Medical Device Standard

Test Strategy boosts Medical Device

Previous Projects

Services

Company

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