Case Study: INCOVA Technologies cuts development time by 50% and achieves 100% controller reuse with MathWorks

INCOVA Designs Intelligent Valve-Control System for a 20-Ton Excavator

INCOVA Technologies, a developer of hydraulic and electrohydraulic controls, needed a faster, more verifiable way to design an intelligent valve‑control system for a 20‑ton excavator. Their prior process used Microsoft Visio diagrams as specs and required software engineers to hand‑code C, which prevented numerical validation, slowed iterations, and caused long delays between design capture and testing. To address this, INCOVA adopted MathWorks’ Model‑Based Design workflow using MATLAB, Simulink, Simulink Coder, and Simulink Real‑Time.

Using MathWorks tools, INCOVA modeled and validated the complete control and plant systems in Simulink, generated C with Simulink Coder, and ran real‑time prototypes on Speedgoat hardware via Simulink Real‑Time; MATLAB was used for a GUI and postprocessing. The MathWorks solution cut development time by more than 50% (from six–seven months to two–three months), reduced design modification time from about eight hours to under one hour, enabled plans for 100% controller reuse, and is currently running on Simulink Real‑Time with Embedded Coder planned for production code generation.

INCOVA Technologies

Corey Quinnell

Systems Engineer