A hardware company needed a complete smart access platform: video doorbell with sub-second calling, NFC-based access, and a management dashboard. Outdoor, all-weather, patent-pending. One engineer owning the full stack.
A hardware company needed a complete smart access platform — video doorbell with real-time calling, NFC-based access control, and a management dashboard. The non-negotiables: sub-second video latency over variable consumer internet, and reliable unlock in rain, direct sunlight, and with gloved hands.
Most smart doorbell platforms cut corners on latency or reliability. At 14 months to market with hardware supply commitments, we couldn't afford to learn either at scale.
Chose LiveKit over raw WebRTC. Reduced time-to-market by months while maintaining sub-200ms latency. Raw WebRTC would have meant writing our own TURN/STUN orchestration, recording pipeline, and SFU — months of plumbing before the first call. LiveKit gave us production-grade signaling on day one, and we kept the client libraries thin enough to migrate if we ever outgrew it.
Chose NFC over QR codes. NFC works reliably in rain, direct sunlight, and with gloved hands — the real conditions for an outdoor product. QR codes fail on wet lenses, glare, and frozen fingers fumbling to unlock a phone. NTAG 424 DNA gave us cryptographic authentication on the tag itself, so cloned credentials fail at the door.
LiveKit adds a vendor dependency — we mitigated by keeping session logic in our own service and treating LiveKit purely as transport. NFC requires phone-proximity, but the UX win in weather pays for it every time. Outdoor hardware ran 40% over BoM target; solved with a revised injection-mold on v2.
DASHBOARD · web
HARDWARE · v2
Working smart access platform live at doorlink.io. Sub-second call connection, reliable NFC unlock across weather conditions, patent filed (WO2025089955). Hardware manufacturing pipeline established with a Hong Kong supplier. In active business-case discussions with Intergamma, a major Dutch retailer.
System design, protocol selection, hardware bill-of-materials, LiveKit vs. raw WebRTC POC, NFC credential spike. Decisions locked before a line of product code.
React Native iOS + Android. Session service on Node/Postgres. Access service with NTAG 424 DNA. First custom-molded doorbell unit with Hong Kong supplier.
Pilot installations across weather conditions. Outdoor hardness revisions. P95 latency tuned globally. Dashboard for property managers.
Manufacturing pipeline established. Patent filed. Platform live at doorlink.io. Intergamma business case opened.
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