Software

Software Engineering

Our software engineering department combines experience and talent to ensure world class, robust and reliable projects are delivered on time.

All of our engineers are experienced in the complete software design lifecycle – from requirement definition through to design, implementation, verification and validation.

The department is structured using flexible and agile development teams who work together with the customer to accommodate evolving requirements.

Rather than being constrained by using generic process for all products and customers, our flexible software development approach allows us to create bespoke projects to fit around each individual customer’s needs.  This guarantees that the best possible software is created for our customers and further enhances our high standards of delivery and quality.

Our highly skilled software engineers are able to draw on experience from many different disciplines of engineering.  At Pektron we believe that a good software engineer will be able to apply their knowledge and skills from other fields to our Automotive, Agricultural, HVAC, Construction, Consumer, Electric Vehicle and Safety products.  Our team come from many different industrial backgrounds, but are unified by their passion for software engineering, learning and applying and utilising their knowledge.

An integrated approach with our software, hardware, mechanical and production engineering teams, along with our onsite manufacturing in Derby UK, allows us to quickly and effectively design the optimum solution for the needs of our customers.

What do we offer?

Close collaboration with customers, to design and create a full project specification.

Traceability and maintainability throughout our code and products is vital to be able to maintain the high standards that Pektron and customers demand.  Industry standard tools like Reqview™ are used to track requirements and provide the link between specification, implementation, validation and test.

All code is written to MISRA C/C++ standards.

Development Protocols and Tools

Experience in designing embedded software for low power microcontrollers right up to multicore ARM chips running custom embedded Linux BSPs or Android.  Examples include:

Embedded Linux boot-time optimisation – presenting information to the end user on high end instrument cluster TFT screens as fast as possible.

Extracting the maximum performance from low power microcontrollers by writing efficient, highly optimised software, reducing the need for higher power chips, and reducing the overall cost.

A good working relationship built up over many years in the industry often allows us to get early access to the latest prototype microcontrollers. This, harnessed with our experience in kernel and driver development, allows us to quickly deliver products that use cutting edge technologies.

CAN/LIN protocol expertise with using industry standard tools like Vector Classic AUTOSAR, Mentor Volcano, Vector CANBedded, in addition to our own internally developed CAN and Diagnostics stacks compliant with ISO14229 or KWP2000.

Extensive knowledge of HMI development and tool chains, from high performance 3D tools like Fujitsu CGI Studio and Qt, right down to simple, low cost, custom graphics stacks.  By working in close co-operation, customers graphic designs can be brought to life on screen, whether the application is an intuitive 2D interface to a consumer boiler, or an exotic 3D interface for a high end TFT based infotainment unit or instrument cluster.

Increased Software Robustness & Reliability

Reduced development lead times and risk is essential.  Working in conjunction with our software engineers, the test engineering team develop specialist software to drive our Vector HIL rigs and internally developed test benches.  This allows both the software and the overall product to be comprehensively tested early on and throughout the development life cycle.

Traceability and Source Code Management

The latest source code management tools are used from the outset of the project, ensuring the reliability, integrity and reproducibility of the code within our products.  A MantisBT server provides a comprehensive feature, and change request tracking system, linking into the source code management tools to provide code traceability.