In today's rapidly evolving technological landscape, embedded systems have become an integral part of our daily lives. From smartphones and smart appliances to critical industrial machinery and medical devices, embedded systems are the driving force behind countless innovations. However, with their increasing complexity and integration into various domains, ensuring the quality and reliability of embedded systems has become most important. This electronic device development involves hardware and firmware development that involves a lot of processes. This article provides a high-level picture of the crucial need for high quality in embedded systems and what could be the impacts in case of failure and how it can be improved over the course of the product’s life cycle.
Quality Attributes In An Electronic Product
Embedded systems, which consist of hardware and software components designed to perform specific functions, have existed for a long time in various sectors including automotive, healthcare, aerospace, and consumer electronics. So, critical embedded testing is more important to maintain a high level of product quality, because it directly affects the performance, safety, and longevity of the life critical embedded products as explained below.
Product Performance :Most of the embedded systems often work in real-time environments and must meet stringent product performance requirements. It can be responsiveness of a touchscreen or the accuracy of a GPS navigation system. ex: Increase in CPU load can lead to sluggishness or inaccuracies, and it directly impacts the user experience and satisfaction.
Product Safety :In critical embedded system applications like medical devices and automotive control systems, embedded product quality is a matter of life and death. Any malfunction or failure of an embedded product feature can lead to disastrous or harmful situation with human lives at risk. Rigorous embedded testing, validation, and verification processes are crucial to ensure that features of embedded systems perform as intended under any circumstances.
Device Reliability :Today many embedded systems operate in environments where human intervention is minimal or impossible such as satellites, remote monitoring systems, and unmanned aerial vehicles. The reliability of these systems is very important to prevent costly downtimes, mission failures, or loss of valuable data. The ability of a system to perform its intended function consistently and without failure over an extended period of time is a crucial factor.
All these attributes have to be considered over the course of the design to achieve high quality in embedded systems.
Embedded System Failure Impacts
When embedded systems fail, the losses can be financial, reputational, and human life. Based on the criticality of the application the cost varies. Some of the impact scenarios are captured below.
Financial Losses :The costs associated with embedded system failures have multiple losses. Companies may face expensive recalls, warranty claims, and legal liabilities if their products fail to meet quality standards. Additionally, system downtimes can result in lost productivity and missed business opportunities. Ex : In the past VW recalling millions of cars worldwide has set aside €6.7bn (£4.8bn) to cover costs. That resulted in the company posting its first quarterly loss for 15 years of €2.5bn in late October 2015.
Reputational Damage :A single costly failure can destroy a company's reputation for years, eroding customer trust and loyalty. In today's interconnected world, news of a major system failure spreads quickly through social media and news outlets, increasing the negative impact. Sometimes it is very difficult to come out of such damage that has led to the disappearance of many companies or their business units.
Human Consequences :In safety-critical applications, such as medical devices and transportation systems, the consequences of embedded system failures can be dire. Lives can be lost, injuries sustained, and families shattered. The emotional toll on individuals and communities is immeasurable. Ex: A fault in the manufacturing process of car airbags has been link to 10 deaths and more than 100 injuries, which led to 14 different automakers recalling around 25 million vehicles.
Beyond these embedded system failure impacts, there are other impacts such as loss of motivation of the development team involved.
Embedded Product Development Process Considerations
Mitigating the risks associated with embedded system failures is a must and for the same, few strategies can be followed throughout the development life cycle.
Robust Design :The foundation of embedded product quality lies in robust system design. Engineers must anticipate potential failure scenarios and design redundancies, error handling mechanisms, and fail-safe features to ensure graceful degradation in case of a malfunction.
Thorough Testing :Rigorous testing is essential to identify and rectify bugs, vulnerabilities, and performance bottlenecks. This includes unit testing, integration testing, and system-level testing under both normal and extreme conditions.
Continuous Monitoring :Once deployed, embedded systems should be continuously monitored for performance anomalies and potential failures. This allows for proactive maintenance and minimizes the chances of unexpected downtimes
Regulatory Compliance :In safety-critical applications, adherence to relevant industry standards and regulations is non-negotiable. Compliance ensures that the embedded systems meet the highest quality and safety standards.
These are some of the aspects to be taken care of during embedded product development process to ensure the quality of the embedded device is at high standards. Of these, the Testing plays a crucial role in validating the device for performance, safety and reliability thereby increasing the quality index of the device.
Conclusion
The importance provided to electronic product quality is very little in today's technology-driven world. As embedded systems continue to grow in various sectors, the potential losses due to system failures become increasingly significant. By prioritizing a robust design and through testing in the Embedded product development process, we can minimize the risks, achieve high quality in embedded systems and ensure electronic products add value to our livelihoods.
In the upcoming article, we will capture the role testing plays in embedded systems development and maintaining the high standard of quality.