| Watch Products Overcome In-Security |
Captor NV, a manufacturer of time-and-attendance clocking systems knows
as well as anyone that time is money and that they had to beat the clock
in more ways than one. Captor was faced with the common embedded systems
market challenge of today: What development path will incorporate Ethernet/internet
connectivity easily, rapidly, and with little risk while avoiding significant
cost increases in an already brutal pricing market. Danny Foubert, Group
ICT/Product Manager of Captor was given the test…
Located in Brussels, Belgium, Captor has been in business since 1987.
"In the beginning we just focused on hardware and manufacturing terminals
for factory data collection. Over the years we put more and more into
time-and-attendance and access control with our hardware. Then in 1997
we decided to start developing our own software solution. Today we are
offering a complete e-HR solution," stated Foubert. Captor found
Rabbit Semiconductor on the web while searching for an alternative embedded
solution that was cost effective while remaining small and offering Ethernet
accessibility. "Size was a very important issue, because we really
wanted a solution that we could fit into the existing product housing.
Redesigning a housing is quite expensive, so we were looking for a small
device we could integrate in as many terminals as possible," said
Foubert.
Captor's development challenge rose within the Omni product family. Omni
stands for 'One Model Numerous Identities,' as "the terminal can
drive a network of up to 7 slave terminals (Omni-String). The terminal
works both in on-line and off-line mode." Of notable use is the Omni
time-and-attendance clock. "The Omni terminal has a keyboard, a display
and several reader technologies. It gathers all the clocking from the
employees, stores them in memory, and sends the data to the software application
upon request or in real time. The intelligent device also stores employee
tables, mailbox messages and access control tables allowing it to function
even when the software application is not running." Foubert continued,
"The Rabbitcore enables the uploading and downloading of data via
the ethernet. The core module interfaces with the main board via a parallel
interface to guarantee a fast data transfer. Upgradability was not really
an issue because we knew that we would not find a product that was 100%
compatible with the old solution. Important to us was a product that came
with a license-free TCP/IP stack so that we did not have to start developing
it by ourselves. We come back to pricing. It's all in one package and
we don't have to pay extra licensing for the TCP/IP stack."
But does the buck stop there? As Foubert pointed out from his experience:
"When we look specifically at what the RabbitCore brings, it makes
Ethernet communication available at a reasonable price. Cost was one of
the issues preventing Ethernet use because it was too expensive. Now,
thanks to the low pricing of the RabbitCore, almost 70-80% of our Omni
terminals sold are equipped with the Ethernet option."
For more information on Captor or the Omni product family, visit www.captorgroup.com
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