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Netilion EcoWatch
UX RESEARCH • PRODUCT DESIGN • SaaS • WEB DESIGN
Sustainability monitoring dashboard for water treatment plants empowered by "memories"
Overview
Netilion EcoWatch is a SaaS solution tailored for Water Treatment Plants and delivered to Endress+Hauser. It provides full visibility into sustainability practices and facilitates seamless communication between all channels from plant managers to sustainability executives. Our comprehensive solution and business model enabled Endress+Hauser to expand the capabilities of Netilion Water Network Insights(NWNI) and create a revolutionary sustainability monitoring system.
Client
Endress+Hauser
Duration
10 Weeks
Role
Product Designer
Key Contributions
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Research
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Analysis
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Ideation
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Sketching
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Prototyping
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Evaluation
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Business Model
Client Expectations
New market verticals for NWNI
Explore market vertical opportunities for existing Netilion Water Network Insights (NWNI)
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Sustainability Dashboard
Leverage NWNI capabilities to design a sustainability monitoring dashboard for water treatment plants
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Business Model for NWNI Expansion
Complete business model to explore the potential of NWNI branching out to a sustainability monitoring system
Challenge
To achieve maximum sustainability practices, the biggest challenge in the existing workflow was
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Scattered data
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Tedious analysis process
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Reviewing historical data to compare past and present activities
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Developing effective insight-based future strategies
To address these challenges, we formulated our problem statement as follows:
How might we utilize data from E+H IoT sensors to streamline data analysis for water companies to make data-informed decisions that drive impactful sustainability strategies?
Solution
Netilion EcoWatch provides a collaborative dashboard that elevates sustainability with transparency, data-driven insights, and seamless communication.
MONITOR
Track sustainability goals
Complete transparency into consumption, production, and decision-making processes
COLLABORATE
Seamless Collaboration
Minimize the dependence on emails with in-system annotations, discussions, & task assignments
COLLABORATE • STRATEGIZE
Memory Palace
Centralize collaboration efforts, eliminating scattered tasks and discussions
Ann Mclver
Director, Environmental Stewardship - Citizens Energy Group
"I really like the way you have called this section memory palace, I can completely relate to this
COLLABORATE • STRATEGIZE
Knowledge Repository
Build a comprehensive knowledge repository for future references & learning
REPORTING
Report Generation
Automate report creation by using templates with variable placeholders for data sources
DATA CENTRALIZATION
IoT Sensors & Excel Compatibility
Efficient data collection, real-time device monitoring, and integration with external sources
John Duffy
Utilities Director - City of Carmel Utilities
"We definitely need something like this, especially to motivate people to be more mindful about water consumption
Design Process
Research/ Empathise
Environmental Analysis
Guided by our mentor Lou Lenzi, I utilized Strategyzer's environmental analysis template to gain deep insights into the water treatment market segment. It helped me ask the right questions to understand the market landscape, trends, and competition.
Key Insights
Consumers prefer sustainability
With increasing concern about climate change, consumers are willing to pay more for sustainable goods and services
E+H's Edge in a Slow-Moving Industry
Infrequent sensor replacement and high switching costs make it slow-moving, with no direct competitors. E&H has the opportunity to expand beyond hardware to SaaS and cloud-based products
Cost savings with sustainability
Sustainable practices like reducing waste, water, and energy consumption can save money and lower production costs
User Interviews
We conducted multiple interviews with a plant manager and the director of environmental stewardship, which gave valuable insights into the sustainability monitoring workflow from a focused viewpoint. Visiting Citizens Energy Group's water treatment plant further deepened my understanding of sensor usage.
Research Goals
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Understand the current sustainability practices and goals
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Identify the use of E+H sensors in sustainability monitoring
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Determine pain points and workflow gaps in the current process
Define
We utilized various methods to synthesize and analyze the data including Affinity Mapping, Persona Building, Empathy Mapping, and Value Proposition Composition
Current process: requires 80+ hours
Key Insights
Manual data processing takes 80+ hours
The complete movement of data from collection to analysis to sharing is manual and time-consuming, taking around 80 hours for one report cycle
Historical data needed to create goals
Historical data is crucial before setting sustainability goals, but it can be challenging to access and compile the necessary information.
External factors impact overall output
External factors like weather conditions can fluctuate the overall output, making it difficult to maintain a consistent and reliable report
Report revisions require a complete rebuild
An update or revision in the report requires the same workload as building it from scratch, leading to additional time and resources spent
Varying report review frequency
Review frequency varies from company to company, leading to inconsistency & lack of standardization
Primary Customers: Data Analysts and Sustainability Executives
Goals
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Gather, organize, and analyze data
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Identify patterns and derive actionable insights from data
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Generate sustainability reports for the organization
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Keep executives updated about sustainability progress and trends
Frustrations
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Finds manual data collection time-consuming.
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Unstructured, scattered data complicates analysis
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Data is often underutilized due to lack of integration
Matthew Miller
Data Analyst
Sarah Jones
Sustainability Executive
Goals
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Gain deep insights into the company's operations, recognizing the connection between sustainability and business success
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Develop impactful sustainability strategies that align with her company's goals
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Keep a vigilant eye on sustainability progress
Frustrations
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Dealing with outdated systems and infrastructure hinders her ability to streamline sustainability efforts
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Faces difficulties when delegating responsibilities potentially slowing down progress
Ideation
During ideation, our team faced time constraints and scheduling conflicts that hindered effective collaboration. To address this challenge, I proposed a solution: individual concept development based on a list of features.
Using these highlighted features, I crafted the 'Memory Palace' concept, which emerged as the most promising idea and got stakeholder approval for further exploration.
How I conceptualized my idea, featuring a memory palace?
I was inspired to conceptualize this idea during a conversation with a participant who expressed a desire to observe past events.
Building upon Sherlock Holmes' Mind Palace, I conceived a system for annotating and discussing data across the dashboard, saving them as memories in a central repository - "Memory Palace"
How would Netilion EcoWatch work?
Prototype
I used Figma to create the hi-fidility prototype, while leveraging the newly introduced variables to create dark and light themes.
Visual Identity
Let's take a look at Netilion EcoWatch
Learnings
Throughout my 10-week involvement, I learned the importance of working together and adapting our approach as needed. Switching between different roles allowed me to gain a well-rounded understanding of the project and its goals.
User Empathy through Personas
This project transformed my perspective on personas. They went from being a classroom activity to a valuable tool for gaining a comprehensive understanding of our users.
Figma Upskilling
My proficiency in Figma grew as I learned to create components and utilize variables. This enhanced my design workflow, ensuring consistency throughout the project.
Business Tools for Decision-making
I gained proficiency in using essential business tools such as the Value Proposition Canvas, Customer Profile, and Business Model Canvas. These frameworks enabled me to evaluate research data and identify features that would bring value to our customers and stakeholders.
A big shoutout to...
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Ann Mclver and Justin Redman from Citizens Energy for interviewing and sharing their experiences. ​John Duffy and Kelli Prader from the City of Carmel Utilities for evaluating our solution. Their insights and expertise were crucial to our success.
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Our E+H sponsor, Matt Walsh, for his instrumental role in our project. From helping us find the right participants to offering invaluable feedback throughout the design process, his constant support has been invaluable.
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The amazing Prof. Lou Lenzi, our guide, mentor, and biggest cheerleader, the driving force behind everything. I can confidently say that I am not the same person I was before attending his class. It has been an immense privilege to learn from one of the finest industrial designers to exist.
