Smart Calculator supports Wi-Fi and has a mobile app that shows transactions on your smartphone.
A year ago, Tohands co-founder Praveen Mishra thought that building a 'smart' calculator would be a stupid idea and nobody would want it. But when he saw a woman running a small shop in Sarjapura, Bengaluru struggling to keep track of all transactions, Mishra realized the importance of a 'smart' calculator that also records data.
When I met the lady, I found that she used to calculate the final amount on the calculator and write it down on paper and then at the end of the day she would again calculate the final amount using the calculator,” Mishra told indianexpress.com. told com. In a video interview.
“The calculator has a basic use case but we can do a lot of things on top of the calculation part, where we think smart calculators will be a really cool tool for shoppers,” Misra explains the idea behind Humble Explaining said 'connected' calculator in one.
Mishra, who hails from Pratapgarh in Uttar Pradesh, started ToHands in 2017 along with Satyam Sahu and Shanmuga Wadiwal. All the three co-founders handle different domains of the business, Mishra looks after the product side of things, Sahoo looks after the apps and software and Vadival in charge of the hardware.
backbone of small businesses
Mishra observed that small business owners are neither comfortable using the Digital Khata Cashbook mobile app nor do they have the resources to invest in expensive billing machines. What they love is a simple calculator to perform the routine calculations involved in everyday life. “The backbone of small businesses in India is still a calculator, whether you go from a jewelery store to a kirana store,” he said.
It was then that 21-year-old Mishra decided to re-imagine the calculator but the challenge was how to make it better. After all, calculators have already proven to be tools that are a fast and convenient way to do calculations in minutes, all at the push of a button.
The first version of the 'smart' calculator developed by Mishra was a Raspberry Pi-powered prototype of a device, with a keyboard and two buttons—one for credit and the other for debit. Mishra then went to a few shopkeepers and showed them a prototype device to gauge their interest in smart calculators. Initially, they were able to take seven pre-orders of the device but Mishra and team soon started working on version two of the calculator.
The second version was a much more sophisticated product and included calculation functionality as well as credit and debit facilities but the screen was smaller and the device used a membrane keyboard. It was only after the startup was selected at T-Hub, an incubation center for IT startups in Rayadurgam, Hyderabad, that Mishra and the team were inspired to take another shot at hardware and layer the design to make smart calculators a reality. . The third version of the Smart Calculator, which is now available for pre-order on the company's website, is more user-friendly and can do a lot more than the first and second versions combined.
Mishra is selling the calculator for Rs.3000.
emphasis on small things
He said that he applied the doctrine of Maya (the most advanced, yet accepted). For example, the button pattern on this smart calculator reminds you what you see on a Casio or Citizen calculator. "If I replace your Casio calculator with my calculator, you shouldn't feel the difference," he said. However, there are subtle changes that are unique to this calculator. The memory button on the calculator has been miniaturized to accommodate the cash-in and cash-out buttons, for which Misra's startup has applied for a patent.
“The calculator size is big and not small and it was by choice as we don't want our calculator to be thrown around in the shop. We wanted it to be a countertop calculator,” he said.
While designing the product, Mishra said that there is a lot of emphasis on small things, like big buttons keeping in mind the preferences of the shopper. For example, the cash-in and cash-out buttons come in green and red colors so that a shopper knows when they press the green button that it means the sale is complete and the red color signifies spending. .
The basic idea behind Smart Calculator is no different from a traditional calculator. Like a regular calculator, you can do basic calculations. The difference comes when you can record those calculations and here comes the 'smart' angle. Connected Calculator supports Wi-Fi and has a mobile app that shows transactions on your smartphone. It has 16MB of built-in memory, which can store 5 million transactions. The device comes with a 2400mAh rechargeable battery, USB-C port for charging, and dot-matrix display.
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