Design

During the Intelligent Autonomous System (IAS) Design Phase, we tailor a set of activities aimed at helping you:

  1. Select the right underlying architecture for your IAS.

  2. Specify the system requirements.

  3. Determine the degree of autonomy and intelligence the solution needs in order to achieve its objectives.

  4. Determine and select the sensors, effectors, comms, mobility, and computing hardware the solution needs in order to achieve its autonomy objectives

There are three ways you can engage us during the Design phase. 1) If you have a software development and/or an engineering staff in house or as a trusted contractor, we can collaborate with them and apply our IAS solution design expertise to provide guidance and review, as well as take on specific design tasks where there’s a need. 2) If you prefer to build your own team, we can help you find and engage the right people and companies to succeed while still applying our expertise as needed along the way. 3) If you prefer to outsource the IAS design, we can assemble and lead a team of subcontractors to perform whatever portions of the effort you prefer.

Even if the Discover phase yields a turn-key IAS solution, or you have already found one, you still may want to engage us to help you specify design-related changes and additions to your existing systems, processes, and infrastructure, configure and integrate the turn-key solution, and prepare for smooth integration and deployment of that solution.

The sections below provide examples of these Design activities. In order to portray the full gamut of such activities, we assume that a fully custom-built solution was deemed necessary.

Architecture and Interoperability

Investigate candidate Architectures and select, adapt, or create one

  • ROS2 (open-source, general purpose framework)

  • Industry-specific

  • Application-specific

  • Customizable Platforms

  • Adaptable solutions

Select internal and external Messaging systems

Specify required degree and type of interactions with

  • Operators

  • Workers

  • Customers

  • Casual bystanders and ‘traffic’

  • Other autonomous systems, Internet of Things things and intelligent machines

  • Other non-autonomous systems (e.g., pure software, traditional machines)

Requirements

Define Governance Policies that the IAS must follow and specify requirements derived from applicable Standards, Policies and Regulations:

  • Laws, regulations, and company policies

  • Operational restrictions and boundaries

  • Operational freedoms and permissions

Specify Functional Requirements such as:

  • Capabilities

  • Behaviors

  • Performance metrics (e.g., required precision, accuracy, activity completion time, etc.)

  • Safety measures

  • Human-machine interactions

  • Operational housekeeping duties, such as data logging and energy management

Specify Non-functional Requirements such as:

  • Reliability

  • Maintainability

  • Adaptability

  • Quality

  • Ability to upgrade/exchange capabilities

Autonomy Design

Determine and specify the required degree of intelligence needed to satisfy the functional requirements:

  • There are multiple forms of autonomy that provide increasing degrees of AI-based reasoning, planning, decision-making, and learning

  • Selecting the right degree of intelligence needed to get the job done balances cost and complexity

Determine and specify whether and how much sliding autonomy is required

  • The IAS design can incorporate the ability to dial its self-management up and down to best accommodate various operational contexts and phases, or based on an Operator’s command

Mechatronics Design

Determine and specify the required types and number of sensors:

  • Some assortment of physical sensors, like cameras, radars, accelerometers, and gyros, are necessary to detect and measure the IAS surroundings and itself in order to perceive, understand, and adapt to its surroundings and its own health and current capabilities

Determine and specify the required actuators, manipulators and other effectors:

  • Since most IAS will be equipped with devices and mechanisms that enable it to interact with the real world, the right ones have to be selected and specified:

Determine and specify the required communication devices:

  • The communication method(s) must be determined (e.g., radio link, WiFi, 5G)

  • A decision has to be made on whether and what GPS capabilities are required

  • Cyber security and hardening requirements must be determined

  • Then, the devices within each area can be selected and specified

Determine and specify the required mobility platform:

  • Unless the IAS is anchored to a fixed location, the platform for providing its movement must be selected and specified such as its agility, speed, energy needs/battery life, capacity (size and weight), etc.

Determine and specify the required computing hardware:

  • Typically, both general purpose and AI/ML processing hardware will be required to support the overall requirements of the solution