Breaking down barriers: Why universal hardware compatibility matters 

Build on your existing hardware with Viam

"Is my hardware compatible with Viam?" This question echoes across our conversations with customers, and we're excited to share a simple truth: Viam is a universal platform that seamlessly integrates with any hardware, eliminating compatibility barriers and enabling automation across industries. Our mission is to dissolve the traditional barriers between hardware and software engineering, empowering businesses to build, scale, and innovate without being restricted by specific manufacturers or ecosystems.

The Viam platform empowers software developers to orchestrate and gather data from a wide variety of machines and devices from different manufacturers. This flexibility means you can select the optimal hardware for your specific needs while maintaining a unified software approach.

Viam's hardware-agnostic approach offers several key benefits:

• Interoperability: Enables coordination among diverse machines, allowing them to share data and work together seamlessly
• Flexibility: Allows businesses to swap out hardware as their product evolves without changing their software
• Efficiency: Streamlines operations by eliminating the need for custom configurations or juggling multiple systems
• Scalability: Facilitates the development of scalable automation solutions across various industries

Viam already supports a wide range of sensors, actuators, and compute platforms. The platform also provides SDKs, APIs, and cloud-based tools to streamline deployment and management, ensuring that businesses can focus on their application logic rather than low-level hardware configurations that will only distract from their mission.

But sometimes customers just want to know if the hardware they currently have is compatible with Viam. And to that end, we wanted to write a post highlighting that the most popular kinds of components used in different machines work with Viam right out of the box.

Hardware categories supported by Viam

Let's explore how the Viam works with a broad range of component categories:

Accelerating development with Viam’s Modular Registry

The Viam Modular Registry serves as your resource hub for the integration of any hardware component made by any manufacturer with Viam. This innovative platform enables:

• Discovery of pre-built modules: Access ready-to-use drivers (such those listed above), machine learning models, and integrations, and get them up and running on your machine in minutes
• Standardized hardware integration: Easily swap or upgrade components without rewriting the code underwriting a machine
• Sharing custom modules: Save development time by contributing and reusing software across different projects and teams
• Accelerated development: Reduce time spent on managing the platform for your machines and their data and focus on making and enhancing the machine itself

The registry eliminates the need to reinvent integration solutions, allowing your team to focus on innovation rather than infrastructure management. Don’t worry if you don’t see your hardware available on the registry yet; adding any custom component so that it is compatible with Viam is easy, and you can also take advantage of any previously-created driver created by our developer community. Read more on how the Modular Registry works.

Our platform bridges the gap between hardware diversity and software unity, enabling businesses to deploy automation solutions efficiently. Whether you're building robotics systems, implementing IoT solutions, or advancing industrial automation, Viam provides the flexibility and integration capabilities needed to accelerate your journey from concept to deployment.

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