Mobile App & Cloud Development: Libratone

“Developing hardware products is difficult. With the help of RUBICON, we were able to push our products to the market. RUBICON successfully created a mobile application along with software for our speakers and headphones. Their team is flexible, dedicated and efficient. We are extremely pleased with the results & couldn’t have chosen a better software development team to work with!”

(Almir Mesanovic, Libratone)

RUBICON MEETS LIBRATONE

In 2015, Libratone contacted our team with a vision. After designing a series of modern, wireless speakers and headphones they planned to release them into the market. Our software development team worked together to develop the iOS application and cloud solution for their products. We collaborated with Libratone, helping them liberate sound.

But who exactly is Libratone?

Libratone is based in Copenhagen and has global offices in China, The United Kingdom, Germany, The United States and France. They manufacture wireless speakers that have a chic, sleek Danish design and produce hi-fi quality sound. Libratone’s goal was to create an interactive iOS app and cloud solution to connect with their products and customers.

Libratone’s Products

Libratone manufactures both speakers and headphones. Here are a few descriptions of Libratone’s core products:

Speakers

Libratone’s contemporary designed MFi Apple Program speakers produce amazing sound quality. The speakers include a 360 FullRoom sound design feature that fills an entire room with rich sound in all directions. The app features presets that allow users to choose & play their favourite tunes. Multi-room speaker grouping connectivity so you can pair and control multiple speakers in different rooms to radiate sound. Users are able to directly communicate with the speaker through Libratone’s mobile application. Libratone’s speakers:

• ZIPP 2
• Loop Speakers
• ZIPP Mini Speakers
• One & TOO Speakers

Headphones

Adjustable, ultra light and trendy headphones that give you amazing sound quality and interesting features perfecting your sound experience.

• On-Ear Headphones
• In-Ear Headphones

LIBRATONE’S REQUEST

Ready to take their business a step further, Libratone envisioned creating a mobile application that would connect users with their products. Libratone tasked RUBICON to create an iOS application with a cloud solution to support the mobile application and speakers.

Libratone’s Mobile Application

The goal was to develop a visually appealing, user-friendly mobile application. The purpose behind the mobile application was for Libratone users to be able to easily control their speakers from their mobile devices, therefore connecting users and products.

The mobile application was to be integrated with international radio markets giving users access to their favourite radio stations and music. The app communicated with the speakers over UDP, TCP and Bluetooth custom protocols.

Together with the cloud solution, the mobile application enabled global over-the-air firmware updates for Libratone devices. The following chart displays the features that RUBICON developed and implemented on the app:

Libratone’s Cloud Solution

The goal was to create a secure and stable cloud solution consisting of the following features:

• Over-the-air-update (OTA)
• Registration of speakers for better support and identifying customer’s issues
• OTA smart push notifications informing users through their email or mobile app that a new update for their speakers is available for download
• Designed with Long Term Support (LTS) in mind
• A global content delivery network (CDN) to support the app, speakers and OTA process

THE CHALLENGES

The amount of variety in Libratone’s Products

Each product consisted of a different design and functions, therefore we had to set up individual solutions for each product to communicate with the application. Some products communicated through Wi-Fi and other products communicated through Bluetooth to be able to stream from any device.

Long-term support

Along with having to accommodate many different products, we also had to focus on backward compatibility ensuring long term support for all versions of the hardware. The cloud solution needed to work with and support all new speakers as well as old speakers that did not get updated. From the oldest speaker to the newest speaker our cloud solution had to function efficiently. We needed to create a stable, seamless working ecosystem.

A global functioning cloud solution

Creating a quality cloud solution useable for users and their speakers all around the world was important. This created a challenge for our team when designing support for the ever-growing Chinese market since we needed to take into consideration the Great Firewall of China. In the end, we achieved an overall goal and our users were able to receive the same quality and speed anywhere in the world.

The UX/UI Design

Our team created a mobile application using a UX/UI design that was created by an external company. They pushed the limit when it came to animations and an innovative design. There were many cool new things they wanted to give a try and our team rose up to the challenge.

OUR CREATION

RUBICON created a fully functioning mobile application and cloud solution. The mobile application was aesthetic, animated, multilingual and clean cut. It was user-friendly and included many innovative features. Users set up and registered their speakers to be able to control them through Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. Once connected, users were able to create their own “SoundSpaces”, adjust volume and settings all through their mobile devices.

Our team created a seamless and stable cloud solution. It fully supported old and new products providing backward compatibility and support. We supported all users and their products all around the world.

RESULTS

Libratone paired their products with our mobile application and cloud solution and marketed their trendy speakers and headphones. The aesthetic speakers were able to be controlled via a mobile device and they flourished in the audio market. Our cloud solution was supportive and stable. We successfully fulfilled Libratone’s requests. Libratone in collaboration with RUBICON was able to set sound free and allow its users to enjoy their favourite beats anytime, anywhere and in style.

TECHNOLOGY STACK:

Cloud Technology:

AWS Lambda

• AWS EC2
• AWS S3
• AWS API Gateway
• AWS SNS
• AWS Route 53
• AWS CloudFront
• Parse BaaS
• Node.js
• mLab/MongoDB

Mobile Technology:

• iOS/Objective-C
• ReactiveCocoa
• Fabric
• Crashlytics
• AWS Mobile Analytics

PROJECT SCREENSHOTS:

INFORMATION:

Region: Copenhagen, Denmark
Industry: Audio
Type: Startup
Duration: 2015 to 2017
Libratone Staff: 51–200 employees
Project: iOS & cloud solution

Originally published at www.rubicon-world.com.