Low SWaP-C Design
Providing solutions for applications with size weight, power, and cost constraints
Modern low-power miniaturised devices have enabled the development of a whole spectrum of solutions addressing areas including wearables, uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAV) or satellite payloads, and personal electronics such as smartphones and tablets. These applications all require some combination of small Size, low Weight and low Power consumption. In many cases, Cost is also an important factor.
Plextek specialises in creating small, lightweight, and power-efficient devices for challenging environments. We bring together electronics, radio, software, and mechanical design expertise to build solutions that perform where space is limited and every milliwatt matters. From radar systems for satellites to body armour sensors and vehicle tracking devices, we’ve delivered compact technologies across defence, commercial, and space sectors.
Why Low-SWaP matters
Although the term SWaP(-C) had its origins in military equipment design, the concepts are applicable to many other target markets. Examples include fitness trackers, smart watches, and wearable glucose or ECG monitors.
Low SWaP devices have numerous benefits including:
- Efficient power usage resulting in longer battery life, making devices easier to deploy
- Reduces the logistical impact of requiring external power sources or spare batteries
- More easily integrated with other technologies to provide custom functionality
- Smaller and lighter systems make them more suited to application areas such as wearables, and satellite or UAV payloads
Successful design of products to achieve size, weight, power and cost goals requires a multi-disciplinary design approach that maximises the opportunity to fine tune trade-offs between hardware, software and mechanical domains.
Real-world challenges
Low power radar for space debris capture
Plextek’s experience in low SWaP RF design has made it an ideal partner to collaborate with ClearSpace on the Clear mission. Our collaboration with ClearSpace has allowed us to further refine our radar technology and address the challenges of the new-space industry. Plextek are proud to provide the Rendezvous and Proximity Operations radar that will be an essential component in the capture of space debris.
Smart body armour impact detection system
The Plextek armour integrity monitoring system is a sensor that continuously monitors a body armour plate to detect impacts that may compromise its performance. The integrity of the plate can be interrogated at any time using a Smartphone App, avoiding the necessity to return the plate to the manufacturer for XRAY analysis. The low SWaP-C design of the sensor gives it a 5-year operational lifetime making it a fit and forget component.
Ultra-low power vehicle tracking system
Redtail is a spin out from Plextek, delivering end to end solutions for the young driver telematics insurance market. Plextek developed a low SWaP multi antenna in vehicle telematics unit, where minimising impact on vehicle battery life was critical, a key enabler for the automotive insurance market. This technology now supports reliable, large-scale tracking of driver behaviour across the country and with multiple insurance providers.
Why work with Plextek?
While competitors may specialise in either miniaturisation or power efficiency, Plextek combines both with real-world deployment experience in defence, security, and commercial sectors – making them a go-to for mission-critical, low-SWaP solutions.
Plextek differentiates itself from competitors in low SWaP design through several key strengths:
- Miniaturisation & Integration
We have proven expertise in miniaturised designs that deliver high performance in power and size constrained environments. We pride ourselves on best-in-class solutions across electronics, software, sensing, RF and antenna design and all supported by careful EMI and EMC optimisation.
- Custom Solutions
- Our designs are tailored to the specific demands of each project. we focus on delivering for low power and weight, which simply cannot be achieved by relying on off the shelf solutions.
- Cross-Industry Experience
- We operate across the medical, consumer and defence sectors, applying technologies from IoT sensing and radar to inverter design and MedTech. This cross-industry experience allows us to transfer innovations in smart and efficient ways, delivering optimised, high-performance designs across diverse markets.
- End-to-End Development
- We take a full systems engineering approach, with in house expertise spanning technologies from cloud and HTML to FPGA and RF. We bring all the necessary skills under one roof to deliver your solution in the shortest possible time and with maximum efficiency. And when your design is ready, our rapid prototyping and low volume manufacturing capabilities ensure a fast and reliable path to launch, with full scale mass production ready to follow when your project takes off.
Plextek combines deep expertise in software and electronics to deliver compact, power efficient solutions for applications where size is limited and in markets from wearables and vehicle trackers to satellite payloads and critical defence systems.
Dr David Kyle
Head of Software
Find out more about these application areas
Industrial IoT
Our IoT framework enables rapid development and deployment of customized IoT solution.
Space & Satellites
On board satellite radar where size, weight, and power budget are stretched to the limits.
Vehicle Tracking
End-to-end vehicle-to-server tracking with ultra-low standby power & wake-on-movement capability.
Wearables
Developing a lightweight, wearable navigation system for GPS-denied environments.
Uncrewed Aerial Vehicles
Alternate Navigation sensors where weight & power budget are critical to extended flight time.
Talk to our experts
At Plextek, designing low Size, Weight, and Power systems isn’t a side-skill, it is core to what we do. We’ve repeatedly solved the hard problems of minimising power consumption and weight without compromising performance. We’ve fought and won the technical battles that come with pushing SWaP constraints to the limit, across sectors from MedTech to defence. If your project demands low power, efficient, lightweight design, this is our bread and butter.
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