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Electronics AI agent · Embedded assistant

Device-Embedded Assistant AI Agent

Answer on the device inside a configured capture scope, disclose that it is an AI system at first interaction, and hold anything outside that scope for the named product owner, who decides.

Typical delivery
4–6 weeks
Deployment
Your stack
Product owner
Scoped capture
After launch
Agent Care

What this agent does

Holds the conversation, not the controls

In

  1. 01

    When a wake word or screen tap opens a turn, take the request from the on-device recogniser, inside scope.

  2. 02

    Where a capture falls outside that scope, discard it on the device rather than normalise it and pass it on.

Reason

  1. 03

    Where the product has a screen and a speaker, draft the spoken answer, the on-screen text and the disclosure together.

  2. 04

    Apply the capture, consent and disclosure settings configured for where the product ships.

  3. 05

    When an answer rests on a document, carry the product source and revision it was drawn from with it.

Decide

  1. 06

    When a request touches a safety function, a health reading or a support commitment, stop and hand over.

  2. 07

    Route every held response to the named product owner for a decision.

Out

  1. 08

    Retain what was captured and why, with the answer given — held in your deployment, not in a shared pool.

  2. 09

    Execute device actions only inside the scope agreed during implementation.

Product statement

The agent speaks; the named product owner decides what it is allowed to say, and the manufacturer stays responsible for the device.

Example workflow

One turn, spoken to signed off

  1. 1Spoken request receivedWake word on the device, a screen tap on an HMI or a head-unit press
  2. 2Scope checkedCapture scope, the configured consent setting, device state and product model
  3. 3Response draftedSpoken answer, on-screen text, the AI disclosure and confidence
  4. 4Controls appliedScope checks, safety-function exclusions, consent and disclosure settings and confidence threshold

No human action required

Stages 1 to 4 run unaided on the device, and no safety or actuation function is reachable at any of them — the product owner's lane opens at the confidence gate.

5DecisionBranches at the confidence threshold
High confidence

Goes to the named product owner.

Low confidence

Adds a safety-engineering read first.

Product-owner review

The response is held with what was captured, the scope it was answered in and the confidence.

Release · Revise · Send to safety review

Released — spoken on the device

  1. 6Device settings updatedOnly where the configured scope allows it
  2. 7Outcome evaluatedRevision rate, held-response outcomes, false-accept captures and owner corrections

Revisions

Every owner revision is counted, corrections included.

What should not run autonomously

Human approval stays in control

Outside the boundary — human approval required

8 items

  • Controlling or silencing a safety function.
    • Using captured audio to train a shared model.
    • Interpreting a health reading for the speaker.
    • Enabling voiceprint or speaker recognition.

  • Automation boundary

    Agent acts unaided

    • ✓Answer product questions on the device, inside the configured scope.
    • ✓Disclose that it is an AI system at the first interaction.
    • ✓Apply the capture and consent settings configured.
    • ✓Hold anything outside the scope for the named product owner.

    Device actions stay inside the agreed scope, and captured audio has no route to a shared model.

    • Retaining a child's voice recording or transcript.
    • Scheduling or triggering a firmware update.
    • Stating a support end date or update commitment.
  • Changes to capture, consent or disclosure settings.

Example output

One interaction, annotated

Everything the agent says is attached to the capture it was answered from.

Assistant output · single interaction

Illustrative example
Device
Kitchen speaker
Spoken answer
This model's filter is released from the front panel
Capture scope
Single turn
Answered from
Product manual, rev C
Confidence
91%
Disclosure
Announced as an AI system at the first turn

As received

Taken from the device and the published manual — nothing on this side is written by the agent.

What it drew on

  • Product manual revision
  • Device state on hand
  • Configured capture scope

Why this answer

Answered inside the configured scope — the owner still decides what it may reach.

What the score decides

Held for the named product owner before anything leaves the device.

Action

ReleaseReviseSend to safety review

Value

Where AI adds value

The same four claims, placed at the point in the workflow where each one applies.

Where the value lands

Value 01 – 04

Every interaction

From the device

03Answering

Answer from the product

Draw on the published product documentation and the device state on hand.

01Approved path

On the device, inside its scope

Routine product questions are answered where they are asked.

02Human review

Send review to what it must not answer

Safety, health and support-commitment requests are held, so the owner's read starts where risk concentrates.

04

Build an evidence trail

What was captured, what it was used for and the owner's setting stay together on the device record.

Integrations

Typical integrations

Five system groups connect to the same agent. Which of them are in scope is decided in discovery.

  • Device platforms

    • Android Automotive
    • AAOS
    • Embedded Linux
    • RTOS builds

  • Voice and audio

    • On-device wake word
    • ASR
    • Text-to-speech
    • microphone front end

  • Product knowledge

    • Manuals
    • release notes
    • Spec sheets
    • service bulletins

Agent

Device-embedded assistant

  • Hears the request
  • Answers on device
  • Holds what is out of scope

  • Support and telemetry

    • Zendesk
    • Salesforce Service
    • Fleet telemetry
    • device management

  • Observability & evaluation

    • OpenTelemetry
    • Langfuse
    • Supported monitoring/evaluation sources

Integration availability depends on the client's existing systems and API access.

Agent controls

Six layers between the model and the room

Each layer contains the next. What gets past the set is listed in the map below.

L6 · Outermost — last line of defence

Inward → L1 · closest to the model

L6Rollback / safe modeReduce the assistant to on-device commands when evaluation or production signals degrade.Roll back
L5Version monitoringTrack model, prompt, capture-scope and consent-configuration changes.Track
L4TraceabilityRecord what was captured, where it stayed, the answer and the review time.Record
L3Owner approvalHold out-of-scope responses for the named owner; it governs release, not whether a released answer is right.Gate
L2Policy guardrailsTest responses against capture scope, safety exclusions and disclosure rules; a failure returns the response.Restrict
L1Confidence thresholdsRoute low-confidence responses to a safety-engineering read before the owner sees them.Require review
Model coreResponse drafted — spoken answer, on-screen text, disclosure and confidence
L1 – L2
Test whether a response may stand
L3
Puts the release in the owner's hands
L4 – L5
Keep what was captured and why it was kept
L6
Reduces to on-device commands when signals degrade

How Nestack evaluates it

Evaluate the whole interaction — not only the sentence spoken back.

Coverage runs the whole depth of the workflow, and every layer is cut by slice.

Surface — the answer the room hears

  1. E1Final-output evaluationDid the answer stay inside the configured capture scope?
  2. E2Step-level evaluationDid the agent use the right product documentation and device state?
  3. E3Tool evaluationDid it read and write the correct device and the correct setting?
  4. E4Confidence calibrationDo low-confidence responses actually attract more owner revisions?
  5. E5Slice evaluationHow does performance change across specific device cohorts?
  6. E6Business outcomeHow many responses needed a revision or a correction after release?

Floor — the outcome the manufacturer answers for

Failure modes

Where each failure originates in the agent

Seven ways an interaction goes wrong, by stage.

Agent lifecycle

Direction of processing →

  1. 01 · Retrieval

    1 mode

    • PB-03

      Superseded product source

      An answer drawn from a manual revision the device no longer runs.

    Stage gathers

    Capture scope, device state, manuals and consent settings

  2. 02 · Reasoning

    2 modes

    • PB-04

      Out-of-scope answer

      The assistant answers a question the product's scope excludes.

    • PB-06

      Safety-adjacent instruction

      A step is offered for a function the safety case owns.

    Stage proposes

    Spoken answer, on-screen text and confidence

  3. 03 · Tool / write

    2 modes

    • PB-02

      Undisclosed AI interaction

      A turn begins without the disclosure that modality requires.

    • PB-05

      False-accept capture retained

      Audio from an unintended activation is kept past the turn.

    Stage writes

    Only where write access and approval policy allow it

  4. 04 · Output

    1 mode

    • PB-01

      Health-interpretive answer

      A reading or a symptom is given a meaning for the speaker.

    Stage returns

    The answer the room hears and the device acts on

  5. 05 · Change / Version

    1 mode

    • PB-07

      Silent scope regression

      A model or setting change widens what the assistant will answer.

    Stage tracks

    Model, prompt, capture scope and consent config

  • Sev-1 · acts outside its scope
  • Sev-2 · a wrong answer is spoken
  • Sev-3 · signals degrade, response routes to review
See the complete Electronics failure-mode catalogue

Affected slices

Overall quality can hide one device cohort

The people systematically under-counted are the ones who never spoke to the device — bystanders, passengers and children in the room. Nestack reports the owner-revision rate by slice, not only in total.

Slice performance — reported separately, not only in aggregate

Illustrative example
SliceFailure rateLiftLift vs. thresholdStatus
Unintended wake-word activations9.0%3.9×Review
Multi-speaker rooms and cabins5.5%2.4×Review
Accented and non-native speech3.9%1.7×Watch
Single-speaker quiet rooms1.4%0.6×Normal

Bar: owner-revision-rate lift vs. quiet-single-speaker baseline · scale 0–4.0× · tick marks the 2.0× review threshold

2 of 4 slices over threshold

Evidence-linked improvement

A cycle ends in a regression case

Nothing closes because it was understood. It closes when the next release has to pass a case, and that suite is what the next interaction is measured against.

Improvement cycle · five stages

Switchback — the path turns at Improve and returns at Learn

  1. 01

    Detect

    Owner-revision rate rises in a device cohort.

  2. 02

    Diagnose

    Which capture, which scope, which release? The team reads the held interactions until one answer holds.

  3. 03

    Improve

    Changes ship against a version with the interactions that caused them.

  4. 04

    Verify

    A failing case blocks release until it clears.

  5. 05

    Learn

    The case is permanent, and the capture rules move with it.

  6. Learn → Detect

    The return edge. The next detection runs against a suite that is one case longer.

Typical build scope

Twelve workstreams across six weeks

The build scope read against the delivery timeline. Week structure follows the six-week plan — discovery, platform, answering workflow, evaluation, integration, then production validation and handover.

Workstream

Week 1Week 2Week 3Week 4Week 5Week 6

  1. 01Interaction discovery and capture-scope definition.Week 1
  2. 02Device platform and audio-stack assessment.Week 1, Week 2
  3. 03Consent, disclosure and jurisdiction-setting mapping.Week 1, Week 2
  4. 04On-device capture and turn normalisation.Week 2
  5. 05Answering logic and product-source binding.Week 2, Week 3
  6. 06Confidence scoring and handover routing.Week 3
  7. 07Product-owner review workflow.Week 3, Week 4
  8. 08Device-platform and support integration.Week 5
  9. 09Capture-scope regression cases.Week 4, Week 5
  10. 10Guardrails and consent controls.Week 4
  11. 11Interaction-trail instrumentation.Week 5, Week 6
  12. 12Deployment, documentation and Agent Care handover.Week 6

12 workstreams · 6 weeks · bar shows the weeks a workstream is active — several run in parallel

Final scope and sequence confirmed in discovery

Engagement tiers

What each tier includes

Rows are the capabilities named in each tier's scope. Higher tiers include everything below them.

Capability✓ in scope · — not at this tierPilotOne device modelProductionProduction device fleetAdvancedMultiple products / markets
Introduced at Pilot
Answering inside your scope✓✓✓
Product-owner approval✓✓✓
Interaction-quality baseline✓✓✓
Introduced at Production
Reporting by device model—✓✓
Review workflow in your systems—✓✓
Approved device actions—✓✓
Device-platform integration—✓✓
Introduced at Advanced
Complex product-line rules——✓
Multi-stage product approvals——✓
High device volume——✓
Multi-market device controls——✓
Build priceFrom $5,000From $8,000Custom quote
Final build price
Confirmed after discovery based on integrations, workflow complexity, device volume, approval controls and deployment requirements.
Separate from build
Build pricing is separate from recurring Agent Care, which covers managed monitoring, evaluations, incidents and verified improvements after launch.

What we need from you

What you bring, and what we build with it

Each input maps to a piece of build scope and a week in the delivery timeline.

  1. 01Your device platform and audio stack

    On-device capture and turn handling

    Week 1

  2. 02Representative interactions from the product

    Answering baseline, product-source binding and scope mapping

    Week 2

  3. 03Your capture scope and disclosure wording

    Consent, disclosure and capture-scope boundary definition

    Week 1

  4. 04Access to device builds, telemetry or exports

    Device-platform and audio-stack assessment, then integration setup

    Week 2

  5. 05Interactions you would not want retained

    Consent cases and failure-mode testing

    Week 4

  6. 06What the assistant is never allowed to reach

    Confidence scoring, handover routing, guardrails and approval controls

    Week 3

  7. 07Named product owners to review held responses

    Product-owner review workflow, then pilot and production validation

    Weeks 5–6

Nothing else is required

Deployment, documentation and Agent Care handover are ours.

Delivery timeline

Four phases across six weeks

Each band covers the weeks it genuinely occupies, so the fifth week holds two kinds of work.

Phase

W1

W2

W3

W4

W5

W6

  1. DiscoveryW1
  2. BuildW2 – W3
  3. EvaluateW4 – W5
  4. Pilot & LaunchW5 – W6

Week focus

W1Interaction discovery, capture-scope mapping and the automation boundary

W2Device-platform integration and the answering baseline

W3Answering workflow, confidence logic and approval controls

W4Evaluation suite, consent cases and failure-mode testing

W5Support integration, pilot devices and targeted corrections

W6One device cohort run under the product team, then Agent Care handover

Reading the band
Each bar covers only the weeks its work is named in. The fifth week genuinely holds two kinds of work.
At the end of W6
Live devices close the validation and monitoring moves to Agent Care.
Duration
Six-week plan shown · typical delivery 4–6 weeks depending on scope confirmed in discovery.

Next step · Electronics AI agent

Build an embedded assistant around your product's capture scope.

Show us the device, what it is allowed to hear and what it must never reach. A named product owner signs what the assistant may say, and we set that name in the build from week one.

Typical delivery
4–6 weeks
Deployment
Your device platform
Product owner
Scoped capture
After launch
Agent Care available

Nestack Agents · Device-embedded assistant

AGT-EL-07 · Agent Care available after launch

Build an embedded assistant

Four questions so the call starts from your actual setup — then pick a time that suits you.

About you
Your devices

No obligation. We’ll map the workflow, name the automation boundary and tell you if an agent is the wrong answer.