Smartko Digital Monitoring
Working under the NYC Design Factory, our team “Smartko” got the chance to build a smart digital monitoring platform for the company Katko.
Katko is a company specializing in electrical safety and load break switches. With over 70 years of experience, Katko has established themselves as a leading manufacturer of high-quality electrical switches based in Helsinki, Finland.
Project Brief
Given the opportunity to exercise full creative freedom in exploring innovative uses for Katko’s products, my team Smartko designed and developed a live monitoring platform capable of tracking and storing real-time data from their switches.
With a $10,000 budget, we collaborated across continents, uniting our team from the NYC Design Factory with students from the Aalto Design Factory in Espoo, Finland, to turn this concept into a functional prototype.
Product Designer
Role
Katko
Company
New York, NY
Location
10 Months
Timeline
The Problem
Katko’s load breakers lack the ability to monitor and communicate key environmental and electrical parameters. This blind spot limits system visibility, increasing the risk of failures and energy inefficiencies. Smartko upgrades existing load breakers into smart sensing hubs, capturing real-time data on voltage, current, temperature, humidity, and CO₂. With cloud integration and intuitive app access, Smartko allows users to optimize performance and prevent issues before they occur.
The Solution
The integration of Smartko’s printed circuit board (PCB) into Katko’s mechanical load breakers provides a digital upgrade without disrupting existing production lines. The retrofit solution, designed as a compact and modular system, fits neatly inside the existing switches. One board installs beneath the central KU unit to measure current, while a second board mounts above to track voltage, temperature, humidity, and CO₂ levels. This configuration enables continuous, real-time monitoring of key operational parameters.
UI Design
PCB Housing
Printed Circuit Board (PCB)
Final Switch Housing
The Impact
Through an interactive web platform, users access live updates on temperature, humidity, gas detection, voltage, current, and power consumption. This allows factory personnel to remotely monitor multiple switches simultaneously, eliminating the need for physical inspections. The platform not only displays data in real time but also provides historical trends over monthly and yearly periods, enhancing long-term operational insights. The control panel alerts users immediately if any abnormalities or issues arise, supporting proactive maintenance strategies and reducing downtime.
Lets Dive In
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User Research
Research played a critical role in shaping my design process. I began by conducting live, moderated interviews to gain firsthand insights into how Katko’s customers interact with the product in their daily routines. These conversations provided valuable perspectives on user experiences, revealing both practical usage patterns and genuine sentiments toward the product.
Live Moderated Interviews
My partner Tanvi and I had the privilege of conducting a live, moderated interview with two outstanding managers from Altech New Jersey, a company that wholesales and distributes Katko switches throughout the United States.
User Persona
Based on our new findings from our conducted interviews, I developed a user persona that represents an ideal user of our design. This persona helps guide our decision-making and ensures we remain focused on addressing the real needs and goals of our users throughout the design process.
Site-Map Navigation
After organizing all the key content required for the digital monitoring platform, I developed this sitemap to visualize the user journey. It illustrates how users will navigate the system, starting from the main login page and progressing toward the six primary parameters monitored by our platform.
Low-Fidelity Wireframes
After gaining a strong understanding of the users’ needs and goals, this stage of the design process focused heavily on experimenting with content organization, layout, and overall platform structure to ensure a seamless and intuitive user experience.
Typography & Color
Since we are designing a digital monitoring platform for the company Katko, I chose to use the same typography and color palette from their website to ensure consistency with their visual identity and branding.
After integrating the selected color palette and typefaces, it was incredibly rewarding to see my design vision come to life. The final layout prioritizes user intuition, enabling seamless interaction and quick analysis of specific switch parameters when it matters most.
The Final Product
Feature 01 - Time Intervals
The ability to track live data at varying time intervals is essential for accurate and meaningful analysis. That’s why Smartko gives users the flexibility to view their switch parameters across different time frames: current, monthly, or yearly. This functionality not only enhances real-time monitoring but also allows users to easily compare performance over time, uncovering trends and identifying potential issues before they escalate.
Feature 02 - Language Selector
Since Katko is based in Helsinki, Finland, we anticipated that many users would prefer accessing the platform in Finnish or Polish. To support this, we implemented multilingual functionality, allowing users to easily switch the interface to their preferred language.
Feature 03- Downloadable Info
A key advantage of the Smartko platform is that all monitoring data is fully downloadable and easily storable, making it simple for users to archive, analyze, and share critical information. By delivering continuous wireless updates and instant alerts, Smartko not only enhances system reliability and safety, it also empowers users with direct access to their historical data. This facilitates predictive maintenance, supports compliance, and streamlines troubleshooting, ultimately extending equipment life and reducing long-term maintenance costs.
Being part of this project provided me with invaluable hands-on experience as a product designer, from initial research to final implementation. Collaborating with a real-world stakeholder like Katko challenged me to design with both user needs and technical feasibility in mind. The positive response from Katko, especially their surprise at how intuitive and user-friendly the interface turned out, was a rewarding validation of our team’s design decisions.
Key Takeaways
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