Technological Innovations with krtkl's Ryan Cousins

0:01
Welcome to the thoughtful entrepreneur show, I'm Josh Elledge, founder and CEO of UpMyInfluence.com, where we turn entrepreneurs into media celebrities, grow their authority, and help them build partnerships with top influencers. So we believe that every person has a unique message that can positively impact the world, even you stick around to the end of this show, where I'll share info on how you could be our next guest, three times a week, five to 15 minutes each learn from successful business owners and professionals. It's time to get inspired. Let's go. Ryan Cousins, you are the co-founder and CEO of krtkl and I'm going to spell that just for those who are listening to us guys can see it. It's krtkl. And that's actually the website as well. krtkl.com. Thank you so much for joining us.

0:57
Yeah. Thanks for having me on, Josh.

0:59
All right. So what is krtkl?

1:03
krtkl is embedded systems company. So we make hardware and software solutions for companies and inventors who are bringing new products to market. So our kind of marquee product is a little business card sized computer module called snicker digital. at a higher level, it's a software re configurable module for industrial Internet of Things and types of technologies. So anything from computer vision, and video encoding and processing, to automation, robotics, real time controls, that sort of thing.

1:47
And so just another way, I kind of got to understand it. So I am familiar with raspberry pi, which, you know, it's again, it's just kind of a platform. And I think that that's a good way to think of another snicker doodle is this, again, it's this platform that you can extend from and in terms of bringing a product to market, it really allows you to prototype and build and bring products to market so much faster. Because you don't have to design all the guts, you know that the foundation that you can do so much on top of is it? Is that a good way of explaining it further explaining it?

2:24
Yes, exactly. Right. Yeah, a platform is usually what we refer to it as, you know, kind of extending that same thoughts, it really is a prototype to production platform, so that the idea is you can take the same core brand that you're using in your first initial prototype, and then that all the way into your final products, you know, going from basically one units to you know, 100 to 1000 to 10,000 plus. So it's kind of like you mentioned Raspberry Pi, it's sort of like an industrialized version raspberry, my so you know, built for systems that maybe have higher input and output requirements. So if you're doing you know, motor control, or some sort of sensory integration, or things that have a require a smaller power, power footprint, that might be either mobile, or maybe the size constrained all these different kinds of kind of optimization problems that we usually see with full commercial products that you know, sticker doodles addressed or designed to address those.

3:31
And can you give me some examples of some products that have been baked with some snicker doodle?

3:37
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So we have a few customers we work with part of our model is we will actually help our end users design our product into their product. So we've been pretty intimately involved with the development of a couple different commercial products. One was a video encoder box. So for a broadcast video type setting. So basically taking high definition video, encoding it and sending it out over an Ethernet interface. Others in you know, range from defense and military applications, which is kind of more, you know, advanced sensing kind of stuff, you know, real time motor controls, like a six axis robotic arm and a factory setting. You know, smart retail, even pinball machines, so it's kind of all over the map.

4:37
No kidding. And so, so pricing wise, then. So if somebody wants to purchase this, and they want to build a prototype, so they can just see, you know, kind of show something off to investors, you know, build something in the lab? What is what's the price of the of the platform that they can use it? And can they extend it? with, with? Any, any, any other things that you might offer?

5:06
Yeah, absolutely. So our part of what we're our kind of ethos is to make this type of technology we're providing more will readily available and usable by a broader audience. So the this particular types of chips and technology combinations we're using are using much higher end associated with much higher in applications, like high end medical devices, and defense, you know, military, industrial, aerospace type stuff, we're we brought that down to the one to $200 price point, as opposed to the several hundred or sometimes thousands of dollars. And, you know, the general idea is extending that whole platform concept, like you mentioned before, is to have these building blocks, these hardware and software building blocks that add on top of that. So we have these system, the core platform is sticking to the platform itself is in the form of a little computer module that can plug into a couple of these daughter boards is big on baseboards. So if you're looking for, you know, just a pure breakout board, so say you just want to plug them some stuff into a bunch of pins way back and stuff. Or if you're looking for something that has, you know, the full video network and audio interfaces, we have some more kind of advanced baseboards, you can pair with as well.

6:32
And Ryan, how did you think to create this? Well, we 6:36 were originally that like cofounders. And I started out working for

6:43
basically the medical device field. And from there, we kind of expanded that out to doing more consulting work. So sort of, we'll just one off projects, both, you know, in the medical field, as well as you know, industrial automation and consumer goods, things like that. And what we found is we're recreating over and over again, the same core components. So the brain piece really didn't change enough for it to make sense to fully customize that every single time we're building one of these products or applications. So basically turned that kind of core piece into a product. And now you know, the end user is able to fully customize all that stuff in software. And you don't have to deal with all the hassles of developing this more sophisticated hardware, managing the supply chain and all the other issues that go with that.

7:34
Amazing. So fun fact about you, Ryan, you're an Eagle Scout, there aren't too many Eagle Scouts among us. My son is actually he's I think he's about two months away from getting his Eagle. And yeah, so we said, buddy, get that over the finish line and just get that done. Because Yeah,

7:51
it's

7:52
been helpful for you.

7:55
It's actually really funny that my first job that I got graduated college was sort of a random thing that was far said fell in my lap, but it was sort of out of the blue and talking with the some of the HR or the head of HR there. After I've been hired on. She told me that you know, the thing that set you apart from the other Dan is we're looking as I noticed you were an Eagle Scout. And that's basically why I'm not the sole reason I guess I got the job, but it was definitely played a big role as far as I could tell. So yeah, definitely push them, make them get across the finish line. It's, we'll be in your resume forever.

8:36
Nice. Well, I'll make sure my son Ethan gets it done then because I he's he's so close, and just needs to finish up his final community project. And I think he's got it. So krtkl for the future, where do you see snicker doodle krtkl going over the next two to three years?

9:00
Yeah, I mean, we've gotten a lot of interest. Looking at snickered at all as a, obviously a platform that people can build around right now. But that we can also scale up in terms of going kind of up the value chain, so to speak. So getting busy upgrading the platform from a hardware and software perspective, as we get more advanced applications. You know, all everything's, you know, getting, everyone's placing more and more demands on, you know, higher technology products, but it's higher bandwidth or more interfaces, always different, different kind of things that we run into when we're approaching these different customers. So that's kind of the next immediate step. And then you know, beyond that, it's really designing more kind of integrated solutions to offer people. So it's kind of going from the sort of components platform level to you know, subsystem and eventually kind of full blown the frog offerings, kind of the direction we're going.

9:59
So imagine there's some, there's probably some pretty good upside opportunity potential for krtkl right now. I'd say you're, it seems like you're positioned pretty well, yeah, I think you created a pretty clever product. And it certainly has so much. I mean, there's so many application possibilities, and you solve a major problem in the marketplace. That's kind of the trifecta, I think, you know, it's like having a successful startup.

10:24
Yeah, exactly. I mean, I think it's, we're definitely a little bit unique, in the sense that, like you mentioned, there are so many very distinct problems that we're solving for different customer sets. So we're relatively insulated from any one industry or vertical taking a dip. So you know, not to say that we're, you know, 100% protected from any sort of downturn, you know, across the board. But having that kind of product and market diversification is definitely helpful. And that was sort of the another incentive for us is to be business solving a core problem that kind of transcended any one industry and then, you know, a stronger foothold in specific verticals and building on top of that as more of a long term strategy.

11:11
Love it. Love it. Well, Ryan Cousins, you're the co-founder and CEO at krtkl on the web@krtkl.com. Ryan, thanks so much for joining us.

11:21
So just great.

11:26
Thanks for listening to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur. If you are a thoughtful entrepreneur or business professional who would like to be a media celebrity and be on our show, please visit of my influence comm slash guest. And while you're at it, take our free quiz and learn your authority score that's available for you right now at up my influence com slash quiz. And please do us a favor. If you liked the guest that was just interviewed. Would you share this episode on social media? Also in your podcast player right now, please give us a thumbs up or a rating and review. We promised to read it all at take action. See, we believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. Your feedback helps us fulfill our mission to help create more media celebrities. Make sure to hit subscribe, binge listen to our previous episodes. And we'll send you the next episode three times a week, automatically five to 15 minutes exactly what you need to inspire yourself just a little bit more, learn from others and grow. With that. Thanks for listening and thank you for being a part of the thoughtful entrepreneur revolution.