The sensor caught every vehicle. Nothing caught the usage; so we built the licensing, metering, and billing layer the hardware was missing.

Geospace-HBD’s Device Licensing & Billing Platform

The Objective

Geospace-HBD’s black-box sensors detect concealed people in vehicles at border checkpoints, moving from distributors to organizations to checkposts. The hardware worked; the software around it didn’t exist. There was no licensing, no configuration, no support, and no metering, one customer could run 20,000 scans and never be billed again, with invoicing done by hand on paper. We took over a stalled build, rebuilt it from scratch, and shipped a backend with three role-based portals that license each device, meter every scan, and invoice automatically. Untracked usage became a licensed product.

Service Tags

Project Rescue Backend Engineering Web Portal Development Mobile App Development Licensing & Billing Ongoing Maintenance

Industry Tags

Border Security & Surveillance IoT

Tech Stack

React (web portals) and a mobile app .NET Core Multi-tier role-based system super-admin distributor/administrator organization Device licensing & activation per-scan usage metering automated invoicing configuration management

The Impact

20,000
scans that used to go unbilled, now metered
A single customer’s usage that the business couldn’t charge for is now licensed per scan.
3
Role-based portals
Each managing its own slice of the device chain; replacing manual coordination, Super-admin, distributor, and organization:
Paper
Automated Invoicing
Billing now runs from metered usage instead of hand-written invoices.
2+ yrs
Engagement still active today
From rescue to rebuild to continuous maintenance and feature work.
The Client

A hardware company that needed a software partner who would stay.

Geospace-HBD builds IoT black-box devices that detect concealed human presence in vehicles, the kind deployed at border crossings and security checkposts. The devices move through a chain: Geospace supplies distributors, distributors allocate to organizations, and organizations run them at their checkposts. They’re US-based and operate globally. They came to us as an existing client from earlier work, which is why they trusted us with a project that was already in trouble.

The Problem

A working device the business couldn’t license, configure, or bill for.

The sensor did its job. Everything around it was missing. There was no licensing, so a device once shipped ran unmetered. There was no configuration layer and no support path for the distributors and organizations using it. And there was no billing tied to usage, a single customer could run 20,000 scans and never be charged again, because nothing counted what they used.

That was a direct revenue deficit. The business was effectively giving away usage it had no way to meter, while the invoicing it did manage to send went out manually, on paper. For a product moving through a three-tier distribution chain, there was no system that could see who had which device, what it was doing, and what should be billed. The hardware could scale; the business around it could not.

Our Approach

Fix the foundation first, then build licensing as the spine.

We came in on a stalled build. The first call was not to patch it but to rebuild from scratch, because the missing pieces, licensing, metering, billing, weren’t features to bolt on; they were the foundation the rest of the product needed to stand on. Trying to layer billing onto a system that never tracked usage would have meant reconciling numbers that didn’t exist.

We organized the platform around the three tiers that actually move a device: the super-admin who oversees everything, the distributor who allocates devices to organizations, and the organization that runs them at checkposts. Each got its own portal, reading from one backend, so a device’s license, configuration, and scan count stayed consistent no matter who was looking at it.

Metering was the decision everything else depended on. Once each scan was counted and tied to a license, automated invoicing followed naturally, billing became a read on real usage instead of a manual estimate. We built that counting layer first, because without a reliable usage record, every downstream number would have been a guess.

What We Built

One backend, three role-based portals, and a mobile app.

Super-Admin Portal
Distributor / Administrator Portal
Organization Portal
Core Systems
How It Was Built

A small embedded team across a rescue, a rebuild, and two years of upkeep.

The engagement ran in three phases: take over the stalled project, rebuild the platform from scratch, then carry it forward through maintenance and product updates. It started with around a designer and four developers and has settled into a lean ongoing team; today two people, one on the apps and one on web and backend. Because the licensing and metering had to be right before billing could be trusted, the backend and the usage model were settled before the portals were built out on top of them. Two years on, the same team still ships updates against that foundation.

Outcome

Untracked hardware usage is now a licensed, billed product.

Every device now carries a license, every scan is counted, and invoices generate from that usage instead of a paper estimate. The customer running 20,000 scans is billed for them. The super-admin can see the whole fleet, distributors manage their allocations, and organizations configure and monitor the devices at their own checkposts, all from one platform instead of off-system coordination. The revenue that used to leak out as unmetered usage now runs through the system as licensed, billable activity, and the client can add devices, distributors, and organizations without the billing breaking. The engagement has held for over two years, which is its own signal.

Testimonials

“The device was never our problem, it worked. What we didn’t have was any way to license it, configure it, or charge for what people actually used. They rebuilt the whole thing around that, and now usage we used to give away for free is something we can bill for. Two years in, they’re still the team we call.”

Geospace-HBD

Product Lead

When the Hardware Works but the Software Layer Doesn't Exist

Sitting on hardware that works but has no software layer to license, meter, or bill it? That gap is exactly the kind of foundation we rebuild from the ground up.

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