New Fiber Certifier from AEM

We reveal AEM’s FibBlu, a compact, app-driven fiber certification kit designed to cut cost, extend battery life, and speed reporting while keeping accuracy on par with lab-grade tools. From GPS-tagged results to OCR label capture and open cloud storage, we show how moving certification to the phone reshapes field work.

• sub‑$10k fiber certification focus and market gap
• app‑driven control via Bluetooth with no onboard screen
• dual‑ended, bidirectional, and loopback loss testing
• open cloud choice with Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox
• owner and user roles with access keys for team control
• OCR label capture, GPS coordinates, instant PDF and CSV
• live two‑unit workflow for main and remote ends
• EMI shielding, calibration guidance, rugged form factor
• packaging options and adapter flexibility for SC, LC, FC, ST
• Blue series roadmap including upcoming copper qualifiers

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If you find value in this content, would you click on that QR button right there? You can schedule a 15-minute one-on-one call with me after hours, of course. You can even buy Let's Talk Cabling merchandise, like t-shirts and stuff like that.

Chapters

• 0:00 Opening, Community, And Housekeeping
• 2:03 Meet AEM: Team Intros And BICSI Plans
• 4:53 Breaking News: Introducing FibBlue
• 7:18 App-Driven Design And Cost Rationale
• 10:35 Phone Compatibility, Battery Life, And Cloud
• 13:45 Projects, Labels, And Instant Reports
• 16:12 GPS, Data Integrity, And PDF Exports
• 18:14 Warranty Approvals And Accuracy
• 19:38 Kits, Cases, And Live Demo Walkthrough
• 22:20 Two-Sided Control And Field Workflow
• 24:05 EMI Shielding, Calibration, And Maintenance
• 26:02 Cloud Choice, Roles, And Access Keys
• 28:09 Naming FibBlue And The Blue Series Roadmap
• 29:35 Upcoming Copper Tools And Positioning
• 31:05 Market Gap, Differentiation, And App UX
• 32:40 BICSI Booth Details And OCR Labeling
• 34:45 Closing Reactions And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_02: 0:00

Hello, Monkeys. Welcome to another episode of Let's Talk Gabling. The podcast is doing it again. I'm breaking the news. Nobody else has released this yet. You want to listen in. Submitted by apprentices, installers, technicians, project managers, designers, even customers. We are connecting at the human level so that we can connect the world. If you're watching the show on YouTube, would you mind leaving us a five-star rating and sending the subscribe button and the bell button to be notified when new content is being produced? If you're listening to us on one of the audio podcast platforms, would you mind leaving us a five-star rating there as well? Those simple little steps help us take on that algorithm so we can educate, encourage, and enrich the lives of people in the ICT industry. Wednesday night, 6 p.m. at Eastern Standard Time, what are you doing? You know I do a live stream where you get to ask your favorite RCDD, and you know that's me, your favorite RCDD question on installation, design, certification, project management. I even do career path questions. But I can hear you now. But Chuck, I'm driving my truck at 6 p.m. and I don't want to get in an accent. Relax, take a breath, I record them, and you can go back and watch them at your convenience. And finally, while this show is free and will always remain free. If you find value in this content, would you click on that QR button right there? You can you can schedule a 15-minute one-on-one call with me after hours, of course. You can even buy Let's Talk Cabling merchandise, like t-shirts and stuff like that. So as I mentioned, I've got a lot of people that I know in this industry, and I this is the first time I believe that the podcast is coming out with something new that nobody else knows about yet. And it's from our friends at AEM. So let's talk to them and find out what is happening with them. What are they releasing at the Bixie Winter Conference? Because it does satisfy one of the most common questions I get asked all the time. Welcome to the show, AEM. How are you guys doing?

SPEAKER_07: 2:32

Great Chuck.

SPEAKER_02: 2:33

Great. So let's go ahead and do introductions. Um, let's let's start off with Steve. Steve, you've been on the show. Just give us the the 45 second, you know, who you are, and then Harshang and then Arvin.

SPEAKER_07: 2:47

All right, I'm Steve Cowles. I am the uh product manager with AEM Precision Cable Test. And uh uh as Chuck mentioned, I've been on his show before. He's been on my show before, Tech Talk with Steve. So um, you know, we're we're all buds, we don't live very far from each other, and we're looking forward to seeing each other at Bixie uh again uh this this week.

SPEAKER_00: 3:08

Hi, I'm Hor Shang, and uh I lead uh AEM's uh precision cable test division in uh based in Singapore and I have been in industry very long, actually, maybe about half the time Chuck and Steve have been around. So yeah, it's it's very nice to be here.

SPEAKER_01: 3:27

Uh hello, this is uh Arvin Patel. Uh so I am uh in the RD uh development team in uh AEM. So uh we uh so we are based in uh Singapore Harshang and myself, so uh that's where we have our RD. Uh so we've been uh developing testers for uh I would say maybe over 15-20 years now. Uh so this has been a long time and we have some uh new exciting products depending on how the industry evolves. Uh a lot of new stuff uh coming up. So uh also next week uh I will be at Big C. So looking forward to uh meeting everyone at the uh AEM booth as well.

SPEAKER_02: 4:08

Well I'll have to stop by and give you one of my stickers. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, you know, I I gotta I gotta put this out there. Singapore is on it's always on my bucket list of one of the countries I want to visit before I before I can't visit countries outside the US anymore. So because it's it's uh it's a beautiful place from what I hear. Yes. Yeah, you must go. I'll turn the I'll turn the show over to you guys. You got something brand speaking new. And and Steve and I did talk about it a little bit before you got on, and when you start telling you, I was like, that solves one of the most common questions I get asked all the time on the podcast. So so uh Steve, why don't you go ahead and uh show us what it is that you got that you guys are releasing at Bixie?

SPEAKER_07: 4:52

I will, I will. So, right here, this is the FibLou product, and it's gonna be used in pairs. So you might be looking at this like it's a box. What is it? Uh trying to figure out what it is. Looks like there's a power button on the front. Well, if you open the top up, you'll see that it's got fiber optic test ports on it.

SPEAKER_02: 5:14

But there's no screen on it, Steve.

SPEAKER_07: 5:16

No screen on it, Chuck. So the way you're going to control this is via a app connected from your smartphone via Bluetooth. And this is a fiber certification test kit. You've got an optical loss test set here to do dual-ended. You could do sit you using one, you could do a loop back. Using two, you could do dual-ended bidirectional, dual-ended single direction. Uh, if if you've ever used our uh our test pro fiber testing options, it's a very similar menu flow. So you know it'll be familiar to people who've who've used that before. Uh the idea behind this is really, and Harshan can add more to this, is that we've we've had customers for some time who've approached us and said, hey, I don't really need copper certification. I'm just doing fiber. What do you have for me? Um and we have a solution, but it's our our full test probe system without the copper testing. It's our our K11E, which is a great product. Um, but we felt like it was time to come out with something um, first off, that could be app driven, but also be a little more of a lower entry point for people who just want to do fiber. Maybe they don't need all the extra bells and whistles because even with the the fiber-only test pro, you can still do network testing and all kinds of other stuff. So um we wanted a fiber loss test kit, and and that's where this product uh sprang up from. Uh and there's some other products associated with it, and I can let Harshang talk about some of the things. But I I can give you to give you an idea of size, um, if you're familiar with our test pro, and these are our channel test adapters for test pro, if you take two of our channel test adapters and stand them up side by side, it's bigger than what this device is. So that that gives you an idea because it's kind of hard, you know, Steve's holding it in his hand. What how big is it really? So it's it's it's smaller than the test pro, uh, a much tighter form factor, uh, very compact, very ruggedly built uh device.

SPEAKER_02: 7:29

So let me ask you this since it doesn't have the display and it doesn't have the electronics and the software that are required to drive that display, and you don't have the the copper certification stuff inside. That's it's so it's obviously gonna have to be it's gonna be cheaper, correct?

SPEAKER_07: 7:45

Yes, it will be less expensive. I don't like to use the C word. It will be less expensive than uh uh considered less expensive than buying our Test Pro K11E. It will be even it will be less expensive than somebody who just bought our fiber test adapter kits to go with a test pro. So it's it's being priced at a point for what it is. It's a standalone fiber tester. Uh and it so it's it's to go after that market. And we feel it really fills a uh a spot in our product line to flush out our offering a little more.

SPEAKER_02: 8:23

You know, I and you and I talked about this before we hit the record button, Steve. And I really wish it I got to start hitting the record button earlier because we have so many great conversations before I actually start recording for the episode. But one of the most common questions that I see asked in the um low voltage nation Facebook group is Is there a certifier out there, is there a tester out there that's sub ten thousand dollars? I mean, I see that question pop up at least two to three times a month. And it sounds to me like you guys have have come up with something that fits that fits that that bill.

SPEAKER_07: 8:56

Yep. Yep, definitely.

SPEAKER_02: 9:00

So Harshank, give me a little background on this. What what was the what was the driving force that made you guys say, hey, we need to come out with this? And what's what's your end goal?

SPEAKER_00: 9:10

Sure, Chuck. So okay, I thought you will first ask me what I'm drinking, so I've got my tea ready. You want my live stream?

SPEAKER_07: 9:19

Yeah, he does, he watches it, yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 9:22

Okay, yeah, so as uh Steve already mentioned, right? If uh we have customers who are only installing fiber, and for them, uh although our platform product is is quite versatile, right? It it has so many features, but it may be an overkill for those who are only installing fiber all the time. So we thought there is a need to introduce a fiber-only tester. And and we have been making like handheld testers for a very long time, and some of the learnings we have had over the period of time is like we have to have like large batteries and so on to support the LCD screens, right? And also some of the cost and size of the tester uh comes from having a display, native display on the unit. Plus, uh, when we want to add features, when we want to like upgrade the software, uh we need to have like specialized uh software tools because you know the the testers run on their own software systems. But if we can leverage what is already done by you know iOS or Android, we could do a far better uh software, uh how to say software features, make it available to the users. I mean, you would see going forward that we can do so many things uh with an app-based approach that would simply not be possible with a native display. So, and and and as we know, right, so many things. I mean, we used to have credit cards and cash, and we don't have any longer, correct? So in our day-to-day life, we are moving away from uh things that we used to keep all the time and using our smartphone to do those things. Why not for testers? So I think this is how we will see things progress as we go forward, and we wanted to do that first, right? So we have this totally app-based uh user interface, which is uh uh which is very versatile, which can keep, you know, you can download from the app store and you know, place Play Store, uh whatever you uh yeah, depending on the OS, but it would it would work uh like just like our normal apps. We it will it will prompt you when it is needed to be upgraded, and and the features that you have on the phone are all suddenly available, right? Be it camera or GPS and you know lot of things. So we uh there is a lot of benefit basically uh in having this, right? In terms of cost saving, in terms of uh flexibility, right? I mean you could connect the tester to one point. I mean, if sometimes like you know, the place where you connect the tester is not very easily accessible and it is tough to do the test. Whereas you can keep the phone separate from the tester and control the tester using the phone, it becomes easier to control, right? And also in terms of uh collaboration, because you may have like somebody sitting far away wants to participate in the testing, right? If you have a phone in your hand, you just share the screen or you know, uh collaborate so easily, right? So uh you don't need to be physically there. I mean, one technician can be there and uh other people may be helping, and it all can work so nicely together uh when you have this kind of uh approach. So, yeah, that's what uh drove us. And uh I this is our first product. Uh, we are looking forward to having a number of uh different products with this concept.

SPEAKER_02: 12:52

A couple of thoughts, and you guys probably already thought about this. Um, you said this is for the people who just do fiber only. I'm gonna tell you right now, as a as a veteran of uh who's installed lots and lots of cables, there's a lot of companies out there where they have one set of crew that pulls copper and another set of crew that only pulls fiber. So it's not just the people only do fiber, there's people who have crews that only do fiber. And then the other thing, and I know you guys have thought about this, if it's already if it's app driven, one of one of my biggest complaints about testers and certifiers, they're all great, they all do the same thing. But if you want to go change the MVP in one tester and then you want to change the MVP in another tester, you gotta go through 14 different menus with an app, there's already a familiarity with the technicians who has the app to be able to do that. Let me ask you this question. Is um because backwards compatibility is a huge thing with phones, um, what is the minimum requirement for you know for iPhone or Android for in order to work with your you need to fiber tester?

SPEAKER_00: 13:58

Yeah. I think Armin, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01: 14:01

Uh uh Yes. Uh so uh I think in terms of uh compatibility, uh we have been uh I think iOS we support, I mean last two years, all the versions that have been there, uh they will be supported uh for Android uh from Android 11 onwards, right? So anyone today having even the you know the basic phone will be able to use it. So uh it I mean it is not a very heavy application, so you don't need a very powerful phone to operate uh this instrument. Uh most of it is uh I mean considering technicians may want to have a separate phone just for testing, you know, so they might want to just get a uh a budget phone and even that will work, right? So uh any phone will work, right? The advantage that you know we have here is um I mean we in terms of you know testing, uh one of the main concerns technically was you know like the consumption of power in a tester from the display uh was almost like 30 to 40 percent. Wow. Okay, and and that reduces, I mean, we are really struggling because, for example, in uh typical testers, you want at least one day of battery life. Uh and at the end of the day, technicians need to charge it. Now there are situations where you may not be able to charge it overnight, you know, depending on the situation. And the advantage with this new set of tools is having separated out the testing part and the uh user interface, uh the consumption of power is so low that you could do four or five days of testing without even having to recharge uh the equipment. So that is one of the things that we're gonna do.

SPEAKER_02: 16:00

Are the test results stored in the app on the phone or are they stored in the actual test or themselves?

SPEAKER_01: 16:06

Uh it's all in the app. So once you once you do the test, data goes to the app, and if your app is connected to the network, it goes to the cloud. Uh all your team members, whoever is in the team, sees all the data right away.

SPEAKER_02: 16:20

So it goes, make sure I understand this correctly. So if I've got my phone connected to the to the test, or when I when I do the test results, it then sends those test results to the cloud. It doesn't keep them on my phone.

SPEAKER_06: 16:33

Yes.

SPEAKER_02: 16:34

Okay. Because because when you said that, when you said that, I gotta admit, I was like, does he know that I've got 3,000 pictures on my phone and I'm always battling not having enough room on my phone?

SPEAKER_01: 16:46

Yeah. So uh I mean that is the advantage that you are connected to a cloud and you just uh you know the data just sinks to the cloud. So you don't if you want, you can keep the data on your phone as well. But if you want, you can just push it to the cloud. So you don't store locally.

SPEAKER_02: 17:03

Well well, the advantage of the cloud is if you have you've got crews, let's say because Steve and I are in Florida, let's say that you got a crew in Ocala testing fiber, but the office is in you know Lakeland, you know, if it's stored in the cloud, then the project manager can instantaneously grab those results, not have to wait for the crews to come back and put those in the project file, print them out, do whatever they need to do with it. That's the that's the advantage of having it out on the cloud. Um Steve mentioned something about you guys being able to do a demo because I would really like to see what this app looks like on the screen.

SPEAKER_01: 17:37

Uh yeah, so we'll uh I'll share my screen. Uh we have a setup. Uh Steve, you you have been able to show the equipment. I'll have a setup as well. I'll share my screen. Uh-huh. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07: 17:51

I'll share my uh can we both share at the same time?

SPEAKER_02: 17:55

I don't know. I've never had that done before. We'll find out.

SPEAKER_07: 17:59

Let's let's see. I'll uh I'll try to.

SPEAKER_02: 18:02

Worst case scenario, we can share one and then share the other.

SPEAKER_07: 18:09

So here is the equipment. So this gives you, I've got this set up to give you an idea of size. So you can see what this looks like against a test pro or what it looks like against the you know the pair of adapters there. Um and then this over here is the unit that I've already opened up the top. So we've got there's an SC and an LC on here. It comes with all the adapters, so you can make both of these SCs. You can make uh make both of them STs, you can have a Frank Turley on here and an LC on the right side if you wish, like we do on our regular on our test pro. Um the default's gonna be an SC. Um, you know, it'll ship with the SC on there. And we think people tend to relate more with an SC. Even though an FC is um a better connection for for testing, uh more people relate with that SC and and just that click in and click out, they're they're more familiar with it. So um, you know, it and and so it's gonna come with the SC and it'll come with the different adapters on there.

SPEAKER_02: 19:11

Is the so you you and I talked about this earlier, so you can do loop back testing, which is pretty cool.

SPEAKER_07: 19:16

Yeah, so so with a loop back test, um, what you would do is you know you've got a light source and a power meter on each of this, just like our fiber test adapters for test pro. There's also a visual fault locator port in here. Um but what you would do with a loop back, you're just gonna loop it back to itself to do your set reference, and then you disconnect from the receive port, just like you would any other tester, and add another reference cord there, and then um you connect it to one end of your fiber under test at the far end, you put a loop back adapter, or you could even put a short patch cord on the far end if you wanted to loot do a loop back that way, uh, and and do that test.

SPEAKER_02: 19:54

Is there is there a way to calculate the fiber optic loss budget in the app?

SPEAKER_07: 20:02

The uh Arvin can show you the app. It uses the um we use the test limits, but I think there's also a loss budget, just like there is on our um, yes. I mean there are multiple ways to select limits. Uh but I don't think it's a it's not a calculation of the loss budget. I think what you're getting at, Chuck, is if somebody knows the length of their fiber, they know the the connectors and all that, uh, they can put their loss budget in, or they know the the strength of the transmitter and the sensitivity of the receiver. That's really how you calculate a loss budget.

SPEAKER_02: 20:37

I'm digging your stickers there, Mr. Steve. I think I need to give you a knowledge as power one.

SPEAKER_07: 20:41

There you go. Um, you mean like this one?

SPEAKER_02: 20:44

No, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no. Like this one.

SPEAKER_07: 20:48

Yeah. Oh, yeah. I've got one behind me, I think. Okay. So yeah. So but but yeah, so Arvin can show you because there's different ways. You can do test limit, you could do lost budget. Um, so I'll stop sharing because I don't think he's gonna be able to share.

SPEAKER_01: 21:02

Yeah, I'll share my I'll share my screen now. It looks like just one of us can share. Uh, just let me know once. Yep, there you go. All right. You should be able to share now, Arvin. Okay. Uh uh, is it visible? Yep. Yes. Okay. Yeah. So this is the uh main application screen. When you start the app, so the app can be downloaded from uh the app store, you know, Google Play Store, uh iPhone store. Uh once you start the app, uh you will see a screen. Uh this is the home screen, right? Uh right on the top, you have your uh login settings. So if you want to test standalone, you don't need to log in, you can just go ahead and test. You know, every all the data stays on the phone. But if you want to uh push data to the cloud and you want to uh download uh information and upload the data, then you would need to uh log in to your uh email ID, which is linked to your you know account. Uh once you are logged in, uh this is right on top we have the connection. So when you click on connect, if there is a tester nearby, you will you know see those available testers. Right. So currently I have two testers. As soon as I connect, the first thing I see is you know, you you you also know how much battery percentage is available right away, right? So you don't have to because the uh tester itself does not have a display, uh there is an indication for battery, but here you get the full information that you have you know 100% charge. And with a hundred percent charge, you could do like you know, easily like 10,000 tests, right? So that's a lot of capacity uh in the testers. And once you select the tester, that's uh gets connected. So we have two testers. Um, the one that gets connected acts as the main tester, which you know initiates the test, uh gets the data and pushes it to the cloud.

unknown: 23:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02: 23:00

Let me ask you this real quick, Arvin. Um if so if I download the app, and let's say I've got two crew, two fiber crews testing, can that one app manage four testers?

SPEAKER_01: 23:15

Uh so every uh no, okay. So one app gets connected to only one tester. But if you have other members, then they would need to also have the app and connect to the different tester. So so every tester needs to connect to uh one app. So it's a one-to-one connection. Perfect. Thank you. Right. So once you connect the tester, you would see the information, right? The tester, you know, serial number and whether it's a main or a remote and the battery capacity. Uh below that you have uh the project management stuff where we you can create a project. So once you go in, uh there are options to uh add a new project. So you you can just create a project and you know uh start the uh you know it could be copper test, fiber test, single mode, multi-mode, right? So and once you uh within a project, you can set up different types of uh what we call as jobs, uh, because you could have say multi- you're maybe maybe doing multi-mode certification or single mode, right? So each of these would be different testers with which you do the task. So we have a single mode which is a separate, you have multi-mode, which will be a separate equipment. Uh, we'll have uh copper testers. So you you can define your job depending on what type of uh uh job is there, and then once you select that, right, you go back to the home screen. Uh you would see the project, you have the job settings. Uh it tells you here how many, depending on how you have set up your labels, it tells you how many are tested and how many are pending and the percentage completion. And also specifically uh for that particular job, uh, for the single mode test, it tells you how many have passed and failed, how many tested, and then you have some statistics. And within the test data tab, uh, this is where uh all the test data is there. You can select any result and you know view the data.

SPEAKER_02: 25:24

Can you set it up for automatic uh automatic naming? So for test.

SPEAKER_01: 25:29

Yes. So there are uh various labeling schemes. So you can have you can import a label list from a CSV template, you can you know create a label automatically uh within the uh app itself.

SPEAKER_07: 25:43

Pretty much like Test Pro does, right, Arvin?

SPEAKER_01: 25:45

Yes, right. And uh the advantage of the app is you can just you know select this and you know, right away you can just generate a report, right? You whether you want a PDF report or a CSV, and this will generate a report and you can just share it because you uh I mean you are in the app, so like this PDF, you can just you know right away click on the share icon and send it over. Right? So that additional tasks which you have in a normal tester of downloading results and generating reports, that is gone.

SPEAKER_02: 26:23

When you put in the the project name, um that's does that show up on the top of the PDF report?

SPEAKER_01: 26:29

Uh yes. So the PDF report will have all of the information, the project name, you know, particular job. Um if you are connected to the cloud, uh so we have what is called a uh user and cloud management uh where a manager can push projects. So if once your phone is, you know, you log in, you will automatically see all the projects that you are supposed to complete.

SPEAKER_00: 26:54

Yeah, you you can even have a GPS location of the point where you are testing, right? If if that is desired.

SPEAKER_02: 27:02

I like that.

SPEAKER_01: 27:02

Yeah, like every test data will have information on the location, right? So that's because your phone has the location information which is stored, right? So uh there have been concerns in the past where you know uh people question the integrity of the data. So having these coordinates built into it, uh it you have authenticity there and nobody can question your uh test data.

unknown: 27:30

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_02: 27:31

So the PDF on a kid's kicked out, because you showed on you were showing it on the screen. Um how would that look on a computer?

SPEAKER_01: 27:38

If I sent that to if I sent that PDF report to a to a uh to a customer, would it look like a regular eight and a half by eleven PDF or yes, yes, it'll be a standard letter size, so you can uh you know open up the test data. Uh I could uh yeah, I I uh I don't have this connection right now, but it it will be a standard uh you know letter size uh format. So one uh one result will be one page, it will have all of the information.

SPEAKER_02: 28:09

I'm assuming you guys at some point coming out with this new test are are gonna go to all the all of the main cable connectivity manufacturers and get them approved for their warranty programs.

SPEAKER_07: 28:21

Yes. Yes, it's it's on our to-do list. So we're gonna all the ones that we're currently approved for, we're gonna hit them up. And uh yeah, I'm sure they'll want to you know look at the units and yeah, some of them may just look at the specs and say, yeah, we've we're familiar with your other stuff, they'll we'll we'll rubber stamp it. But I I think some of them are gonna want to actually get it in their hands and test it.

SPEAKER_02: 28:44

Yeah, you guys have built up a good reputation in the industry. I'd I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority will look at and say, oh, okay, AM check, it's good.

SPEAKER_06: 28:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 28:55

I think the advantage is that you know, having worked on uh test pro you know development for the optical part, uh, we have a really good understanding on what it takes to make a good fiber certifier, right? And all of that knowledge is what is going into these fiber certifiers, right? So in terms of accuracy and performance, uh we uh match it to test pro performance.

SPEAKER_02: 29:21

How's this tester come packaged? If I if I order one for my cruise, um how does it come to me? Is it is it gonna be in a hard case like Pelican style thing, or is it gonna come like your your test pros?

unknown: 29:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 29:34

So uh again, that is optional. So users can opt for just getting a soft case or they can opt for a hard case. So it's uh you user can opt for whatever configuration they need.

SPEAKER_02: 29:49

Very cool.

unknown: 29:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_01: 29:51

So yeah, yeah, maybe I'll just uh do a quick test. So once you have so at the bottom, you have like the home screen, you have a test icon. When I go in the test icon, uh I have a fiber connected. So this is a real-time wire map. Uh you connect the fiber or disconnect. You can you know see the connection in real time. Uh, one of the cool things is that even a person on the far end can connect to the tester on the far end and see the map on his phone, right? So two people can connect to one can connect to the main site, one can connect to the remote side, and I'm confused because I thought you said earlier that the app can only only one app can connect to it at a time.

SPEAKER_02: 30:32

Oh, one app can set one handset. So okay, I got you now.

SPEAKER_01: 30:39

Right. So because sometimes you have a technician on the far end who is, you know, installer uh who is connecting the fibers and uh he doesn't know you know whether the connectivity is there. Uh there could be one person who walks over to the other end, plugs in, and they want to start the test from the other end, they can also do that, right? So it's supported both ways.

SPEAKER_07: 31:01

Is there and it'll store it'll store locally, right, Arvin? So it'll store on each of the phones if they're they're trading off testing like that. And then when they store the cloud, it all goes into the game. Data goes to the cloud, yes.

SPEAKER_01: 31:13

Because both of them will need to be on the same project.

SPEAKER_02: 31:16

So sometimes when you're testing fiber, you might not even be in the same building. You might be in a whole different building. Is there a way to chat back and forth through the app between the two technicians? Uh I mean you have the phone, so you could just call it. Yeah, but the phone they got the app on their phone, you know, uh or dealing with the app.

SPEAKER_01: 31:35

Yes. So not through the app, but uh, I mean, we you know, while uh technicians have been using this, I mean they are always on the phone because they are telling them which uh you know port to plug into. So they have the phone on and they have the app running. So both things uh it's possible to you know communicate easily.

SPEAKER_02: 31:55

Is the internal mechanisms is the internal mechanisms on this uh susceptible to because not not every not every technician might be using their phone to communicate. Sometimes I use two-way radios. Um is is there is or is are the internal mechanisms on this susceptible to EMI from two-way radios?

SPEAKER_07: 32:16

Uh we tell are we talking about the hardware or the phones? The hardware today. No, no, not the phones, we're talking about the actual hard fiber to see.

SPEAKER_00: 32:23

Yeah, it's a very good question, Chuck. Uh in fact, uh the optical front end is all shielded just to cat just to address this this concern. Right? So perfect. Yeah, because you know we are going to use phone, and phone sometimes can be near to the device.

SPEAKER_05: 32:39

Right.

SPEAKER_00: 32:39

Uh of course there may be other RF interference, but phone is the primary one which is intended to be near the device. So yeah, it is taken care of.

SPEAKER_05: 32:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 32:49

And and we, yeah, the testers have also the uh radiation and you know uh uh immunity uh testing done. So it is compliant, meets the spec, but uh we have a more tighter spec because we want to make sure external interference doesn't interfere with the measurement data as well.

SPEAKER_02: 33:07

So so with the copper testers, you know, you gotta get them uh you gotta get them recertified every year. Does that apply the same thing here to this new fiber tester?

SPEAKER_01: 33:18

Uh yes. I mean, if you need certification and warranty purposes, you would want to get the testers uh calibrated because this is also mainly driven. Um, I mean, with aging, you know, as let's say you're doing thousands of tests over the tester, a lot of there is wear and tear, right? So most of the issues we see are related to wear and tear. Uh in terms of the electrical performance, it's uh uh we we have this set reference mechanism, right? So it sort of zeros out your connections. Uh the optical uh power levels can vary, but when you do the set reference, it's reference, it's you're you're not taking an absolute value for measurements, you are taking a relative measurement. So that doesn't really uh deteriorate uh so much.

unknown: 34:09

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_02: 34:10

So I'm assuming the app is free from the from Google Play or the App Store. Uh but you mentioned the cloud thing, is there any subscription cost for the cloud service?

SPEAKER_01: 34:22

Okay, so so this is the beauty about this product is um there is uh basically the um the requirement is that you use your own cloud, right? So you you may have a Google account, right? And you can just use your Google Drive to upload the data, or a company may have its own OneDrive or Google Drive, right? So you use uh so I'll just take a step back. Uh I go back and uh we have uh uh I'll just log out. So when you when you log in, uh you pick your whether you have a Google Drive or a OneDrive or a Dropbox. And then your normal credentials will get you into that and into the Yes, because you you basically the data is stored either in your account or your company account. It's not on AEM's uh drive.

SPEAKER_02: 35:26

Gotcha. What's the I see the you got an owner login and a user login? Yes. What's the differences between those two logins?

SPEAKER_01: 35:33

Okay, so owner is uh, for example, a company manager, right? So let's say you have a uh you know uh department head who wants to who is managing a team of say 20, 30 technicians, right? So the owner will have his login and then he can assign uh for example, uh where the user login is, the technicians don't need to have their own accounts, they can just log in, right? And the owner will assign tasks to them. So the technicians will just receive it, and all of the data for the technicians uh will go to the cloud account uh which the owner has set up. So, for example, let's say I'm setting up a Google Drive and I put owner login, and here I I'm just going to use a Google uh Google Drive. So I'll just put in So I just uh I pick my uh Google account and then when when you sign in, you just uh give it permission to store data and continue, right? So once you create this, all the data will go into this account that you have logged into as a user, as a owner. So you don't have to rely on um any company to store and retrieve your data, everything stays within your organization.

SPEAKER_02: 37:24

Does so the so the so with the user profile, does the does the does the owner profile have to create the the user profile so they can log in, or does the user profile create their own? Okay.

SPEAKER_01: 37:36

Yeah. So for example, once the owner has, uh I can add uh all the technicians' names here. So if I want say Harshan to or Steve to uh do testing, I can, you know, and I can then put uh Steve's email ID, uh whatever is the email. Right. And whether I can assign him as a manager or so I can assign him as a manager so he can have a few technicians under him, right? So once I add Steve, right? Uh he will be able to log in with his account and whatever projects I'm pushing, he will be able to see it.

SPEAKER_02: 38:16

Gotcha, perfect. I I do have a question to ask you, and this is totally out of my realm because I am I'm a I'm a cable guy, I'm not a software guy, but let's talk about cybersecurity. What if you have you guys thought about locking this down so it can't get hacked or get into get into the test or anything like that?

SPEAKER_01: 38:34

Um okay, so the users will never know where the data is going because the user once they log in, it's uh the user is using his email ID and owner has put uh you know the user's email ID. So the data gets pushed to the user, and there is a uh for example, when I created uh let's say I'm just going back. So when I create a manager, uh I need to share an access key with Steve. So once Steve logs in with the access key, he automatically can push data to the cloud, but he will never know where it is going because uh the information is encoded, right? So there is no way for anybody to even know where the data is. So it's the owner's responsibility to make sure he adds in the right people in the team, right? And the team doesn't know where the data is going. So the only the owner knows where the data is pushed.

unknown: 39:38

Gotcha.

SPEAKER_01: 39:38

How how did you come up with the name? Uh yeah, so uh it's interesting because I mean we started off with uh uh uh uh the initial letters are like fiber, yeah. Because it uses a uh a wireless technology for Communication. So we combine those two and uh that's how uh the fib blue name comes from.

SPEAKER_00: 40:07

We have yeah, we wanted to uh make the name look like it is a a smaller cool product, not not not very you know complex test equipment. So that that simple blue kind of uh uh look good. And then we said like okay, we create this blue series. So this is flip blue for fiber, so we can expect like coop blue for copper and and so on and so forth. So there will be yeah, we as I said earlier, so our intention would be to have uh a number of products in this blue series, app-based products, and then the app itself is called UniBlue to like kind of combine all of that.

SPEAKER_02: 40:53

And refresh my memory, did you say you wanted to talk about the other product?

SPEAKER_00: 40:58

Uh yeah, I mean uh we have we have a copper, a simple copper tester uh that we will be uh launching soon. Right? So it starts with a very low end uh low priced product as uh uh as a wire map type tester, and and then we also have variants of it that can actually connect to this app and do far more functionality than just the wire map and connectivity and tone generation and stuff like that, even PoE testing. So we we we have uh we have plans to launch uh the copper testers uh soon after.

SPEAKER_02: 41:36

Gotcha. So the the copper test or um does it use the an app as well?

SPEAKER_00: 41:42

Yes, correct. So so the the most basic copper tester is uh uh without app, but uh then there are variants that actually use this app and and do uh more testing, and you can get advantage of the all this traceability, storing the results uh from that app, from this specific app, yeah, for the small complexity.

SPEAKER_02: 42:04

It's the same app, the same app for everything. Gotcha. So does the is the copper testers are they certifiers or verifiers or are they qualifiers?

SPEAKER_00: 42:13

Qualifiers. I mean uh I I I uh I always confuse in these terms, but the like basic uh like wire map, plant, uh, PoE, uh that sounds like a very home generation.

SPEAKER_07: 42:30

Yeah, the verifiers. Yeah, those yeah, those yeah, the lowest end one would be a verifier and then and then probably qualifier, uh validator, you might call it. There'll be a variety of products, right? So it'll cover the whole spectrum.

SPEAKER_00: 42:44

Yeah, but not not certifier, probably.

SPEAKER_02: 42:47

Yes. What what does this do to your steps? Your anchor product that you got now, the the the the tester that you're that you got is is it are they gonna coincide in the same space together, or are they gonna be ones targeting uh you know for different types of customers? Because I'm thinking about the person who just bought you know a brand new AEM tester.

SPEAKER_07: 43:07

I I think it I think it's gonna be a bit of both, Chuck. I think you're gonna see we we currently have customers who will buy a test pro and then they'll add an NSA because they go, Oh, you know, I want to get this qualifier plus that you got. Um, but we've also got customers who like for I'll I'll talk about fiber and copper. So for the fiber, and I think you you touched on this, where they want to test copper and fiber at the same time, maybe on the same project or maybe on two different projects. With with the new fiber products, they can do just that. With copper, what we're getting is is a lot of customers will say, you know what, I've got I've got two test pros and I've got two NSAs, I've got these for my key technicians, but I've got a fleet of trucks. I don't need to give every technician one of these. Do you have something that will allow me to send a technician out? They can go out on a troubleshoot call, check things out, or just a basic, you know, some you know, a move ad change where they don't need a certifier for some small project. Um and that's where we think this actually fills uh I wouldn't call them holes in our product line. And I've never thought we had any holes in the product line, but I always thought there were things we could do to supplement the product line uh and sell more. And I think that's where these products really fit in. And then you do have those customers who um on the lower end copper, that's all they need. Um and and you know, it'll go after that market as well.

SPEAKER_02: 44:35

Uh correct me if I'm wrong, I don't think any of the other test manufacturers have anything even similar to this fiber tester, do they?

SPEAKER_06: 44:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 44:45

Oh. There is nothing out there which has you know this full-fledged application, you know, for certification testing. I mean, there are a lot of small tools, but they don't even save data or you cannot even manage your projects, right?

SPEAKER_02: 44:59

So this is a full-fledged uh I I love the fact that it's app driven because like I said, you know, when you look at the average age of installers and technicians, they're they're going to be 18 to 30. And those those that age group, there's nothing wrong with this, because my wife accuses me of doing this all the time. They're always on their phone. They're very familiar with their phone. So I like the fact that this has a let me ask you you may not want to share this. Did you guys write your own app? Yes. Yes, yes. There's a lot of people don't realize how much energy and cost goes into writing your own app. Are you guys gonna be at Bixie? Uh yes. Yeah. Steve is there?

SPEAKER_01: 45:41

I'll be there at Bixie. So look at that. We are meeting up.

SPEAKER_07: 45:44

Booth? Yep. Yep. I'll be I'll be speaking on Tuesday. We've got a booth, uh booth 1312 uh is our booth number.

SPEAKER_01: 45:58

I'll just send a quick test just to you know give you a feel. So when you go in the test uh menu, uh you see on the top we have a camera icon. So the cool thing here is you can use your phone to scan you know the labels and the label, whatever is the label uh stuck onto the fiber, you know, or the port, uh, that will automatically be loaded as your label for the code.

SPEAKER_02: 46:21

Oh, so it's got it's got character recognition. Yes. That is cool. Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 46:26

So we make use of the advantages, you know, that lie in the phone and then build on that.

SPEAKER_02: 46:32

Right. Well, you guys have done a good job. I can't wait to put my hands on this, run them at the Blixy conference and get to play with this thing.