How a Cleantech Startup Built Air Quality Monitors in Record Time
A Cleantech startup shipped environmental monitoring hardware to 50 sites in 3 months using Schematik and off-the-shelf sensors.
#From Prototype to 50 Deployments in Three Months
FreshAir Labs (name changed) needed to deploy indoor air quality monitors across offices, schools, and clinics. Their prototype worked — an ESP32 with PM2.5, CO2, and VOC sensors — but turning it into a producible design was blocking them. Schematik helped them move fast.
#The Challenge
Their team had strong firmware skills but limited PCB experience. Previous iterations had manual schematic errors: wrong sensor pinouts, missing pull-ups, and power rail mistakes that only showed up in testing. Each respin added weeks. They needed to get the schematic right the first time and iterate on firmware in parallel.
#How Schematik Helped
They modeled their design in Schematik, using our component library for the ESP32 and sensors. The built-in DRC caught a missing decoupling cap and a reversed I2C pull-up before they ever sent files to a fab. Export to KiCad gave their contractor a clean starting point for layout. They cut respins from three to one.
By month three, they'd shipped 50 units to pilot customers. The hardware held up; their focus shifted to calibration and data dashboards. "Schematik didn't just save us time — it gave us confidence the schematic was correct before we committed to manufacturing," their lead engineer said.