Bouchard Industries Corp., Ottawa, ON (2026)

10/01/2026

We are building a dumbphone with an ePaper display and keyboard that runs Linux for privacy. We are also making the phone as useful as possible without the toxic apps.

Here is our latest update:

Power management
We decided to prioritize power management over everything else since the last update. We made some great progress, after many weeks of research, trial and error, we managed to de-risk multiple features that were critical to the projects success.

We got some big wins since the last update. First off, prototype 2 is now fully powered via the battery!

We are now able to put the cpu on standby, which means it can go as low as 7mA-15mA.

The cellular chip can also be on standby and it can wake up when you receive a call or text.

We got the cellular chip to wake up the cpu from calls or texts, this means we can now put the phone mostly to sleep, saving a lot of power when the device is not in use and we are still able to receive calls and texts. This has been a major breakthrough for us and it gives us a lot of flexibility on the size of the battery.

We were able to get the entire prototype down to around 25mA on standby, ready to receive calls and texts. These numbers are exciting for us because it means a longer battery life on standby and it's slightly better than the average modern smartphone on standby.

We also did some further optimizations with power. Every component can now be shutdown when not in use. The entire system can now be turned on with a press of a button. This amount of power control required a good amount of rework, which will be worth it's weight in gold.

We still have quite a bit of work to optimize power when the device is fully in use, but we have a clear path forward.

Charging
We also implemented charging. At the moment, we currently have two ways of charging, slow charging, that also lets you connect to a pc and interact with the phone. We also have a separate connection for fast charging only. We will most likely combine these two in the final design.

Camera
We spent quite a bit of time getting the programmable real time unit based capture feasible. We noticed that we did not have enough consecutive PRU lines to achieve this since some of the lines are used for audio, but we figured a way to separate the horizontal reference data to shared memory, meaning it will actually be possible in the final design to use this type of camera. It is the least power intensive camera from our R&D efforts. We still have work to do to get it as stable as possible, though it's looking promising.

Here is our current hardware stack for prototype 2:
CPU + RAM / SoC
Audio input and output, onboard mic and onboard speaker
Audio input and output switching via 3.5mm headphone jack
Motor for notification
Epaper display + touch + front light
Cellular chip + GPS
Keyboard
9 axis chip for orientation
Boost converter for higher voltage components
Fast charging
Programmable real time unit based capturing camera
Battery reading chip
Battery
Circuitry for controlling power

At this time, we have all hardware we wanted in our prototype 2 except for Wi-Fi. The original plan was to complete Wi-Fi in the tail end of the summer, but we had to put it on hold while we researched and developed power optimization. The power side of things proved to be intensive.

After we have Wi-Fi working and optimized, we will start manufacturing the prototype in sections (for ease of troubleshooting since it's a complex board). Once everything works separately we will create a single board.

Software
With the majority of our efforts focused on the hardware during the summer, we took some time recently to focus on the software side of things.

As most of you know, we are not using Android for this project, which makes it more challenging to implement certain features. One of those important features is WhatsApp. On one of our Reddit post, Reddit user u/johnny219407 recommended Matrix for WhatsApp. We decided to look into it and we got outgoing and incoming messages working. This is a great first step as it will allow us to design a user interface around this and enable WhatsApp messaging on the phone. You will also be able to host your own server with our instructions and software suite.

In theory, going with Matrix also allows us to integrate with other messaging platforms like Signal, Telegram, Messenger, Slack, Teams, etc.

We still have a good amount of work to do on this feature, but it's a great step forward.

Follow us on Kickstarter for more updates:

Includes key missing features from current dumbphones + more privacy. No way to install new apps, your discipline won't be tested.

07/25/2026

We are making good progress on The Basic Phone Prototype V2!

We have de-risked a lot, here is what we have accomplished since the last update:

CPU
At the time of writing this, a few SoC (system on chip) for the CPU section of the board are being manufactured. We directly contacted Octavo Systems and they will continue making the CPU we selected for many years to come.

Keyboard
We ported the keyboard we originally had on V1, onto V2 (hardware and software). We will need to do one more iteration of it to make it thinner. We already have a plan in place.

Audio
We can now convert digital audio to analog and amplify it, which means.. We got audio! We are now able to play music or notification sounds on the speaker of the phone. We are using completely different integrated circuit than our original prototype for audio. What we use now is much smaller and less power hungry than what was in the original prototype.

Mic
We also integrated a digital mic, which lets you record audio and save it on the phone.
In the original prototype, we had a digital and analog mic. We were able to condense it down to one mic, the analog mic was redundant.

Cellular Network
Related to that, we got our network chip working with our new system. With our audio work, we were able to redirect audio from the digital microphone into voice calls, as well as route incoming call audio from the network chip to the speaker. At this point, we can officially call it a phone again, but of course, we still have a lot to do.

We can now acquire GPS fixes with the new cellular chip. The GPS in this new network chip is much better than the one in our original prototype. It has faster fix times (you can pin point your location on maps faster). We also contacted Quectel to confirm the chip is still being produced for many years to come.

Motor
We now support the vibration motor for notifications. This will grab your attention if someone sends you a text or call, but you will be able to disable it.

ePaper
We were able to render to the ePaper display with the new system, we also ported our UI from V1.

Touch is now implemented on the ePaper display with the new system.

We've completed front light support on our ePaper display. It required us to design a new PCB because the one driving it was much too large. This design will be merged in our final PCB. What's exciting is that it uses much less power than we originally thought. The original prototype had no component to drive the front light.

3.5mm headphone jack
After reviewing and implementing community feedback we now support 3.5mm output! When you plug in a 3.5mm headset, audio automatically switches from the speaker to the headset. Next step is to also support input on the same line. We have some preliminary work done already as we have successfully converted 3.5mm analog audio to digital.

Wi-Fi
This is our main focus at the moment. The chip we wanted to use is consuming too much power, we needed to pivot and look at a few more options. We found a chip from Texas Instruments that was already integrated with a similar SoC that should work with our system. We spent quite a bit of time re-designing the PCB for this section to make it compatible with or SoC. We essentially made a Wi-Fi hat for our SoC. The design is done and a few boards are currently being manufactured for testing. This will also be merged into one PCB (as with everything) later on. We should be able to test in out in the next few weeks.

Next steps
Our next step is to ensure our Wi-Fi board works, get the camera working, finish 3.5mm input and finish the porting work of our software from the old prototype to the new one. As we have been working on this new prototype, we continue to monitor each component's power consumption. We also need to select a stable battery and complete the battery management system so the device can fully run from the battery, charge correctly and accurately report its charge level. We already have experience with this when we worked on V1.

After that we will design a single board, then create the injection molds for it, which we will then be ready to launch the Kickstarter!

Core values
One of our core values is to always improve. As you can see, we have improved a lot in the project since the last prototype and we continue striving to make this a solid product.

Podcast with Returning Retro!
Returning Retro aims to return to a simpler time of tech, when we used it deliberately instead of compulsively. It very much aligns with this project. Here's a podcast episode we recorded with Returning Retro about The Basic Phone. Subscribe to their channel if you want to see more cool upcoming intentional tech!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYe5nphYu9I

Timeline
The project is progressing well, although, slightly slower than expected. We originally mentioned launching Kickstarter between late 2026 and early 2027. After evaluating our progress, we've decided to target early 2027, assuming everything continues to go well. It's better to launch when we are ready vs launching too early. That said, please be patient, great things are coming and we truly believe The Basic Phone will help you reclaim your life.

Pricing
We know a price change isn't what anyone wants to hear, but let's start with the important part. We are still offering a small super early bird batch at $399 on Kickstarter, because that's the price we originally quoted and we want to honor it. At that price, we are essentially breaking even, it doesn't leave room for certifications or a buffer for unexpected costs, but it matters to us to keep our word in some form. Once that batch is gone, pricing moves to early bird, followed by our standard pledge tier, each roughly a few hundred dollars above the last, we are leaving the exact numbers open for now, so we don't repeat what happened with our original estimate. We would rather confirm them once costs are final than revise them again later. This way we can be much closer to what it actually costs us to build and deliver the phone sustainably and to keep supporting it after launch.

Here's why the numbers moved. When we first estimated pricing, a lot of costs were still unknown. Now that we are close to finalized the bill of materials and gotten real manufacturing quotes, tooling, certifications, assembly, testing and platform fees, those numbers came in significantly higher than our early estimates. At the same time, we've kept improving the hardware, reducing power consumption, redesigning major subsystems and validating every part of the platform. Our goal is to produce a product that's reliable and built to last, not one that cuts corners to hit a number we picked before we knew better.

We would much rather find this out now, before launch, than after.

Thank you for your continued interest and support in the project!

Come join us on Discord to discuss further: https://discord.com/invite/HVpbcddsXJ

Follow the Kickstarter here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/bouchardindustries/the-basic-phone-a-dumbphone-without-disadvantage

Join our newsletter here: www.dumbphone.ca

Before we close, we want to share something personal.

Legacy
In honor of Dr. Guy Savoie 1932-2026 (recent passing of the grandfather of the founder)

Dr. Savoie was a respected surgeon, an accomplished pilot and a passionate advocate for aviation. At a time when aviation opportunities were limited, he earned his pilot’s licence, founded a flight school, established Frontair and created an air ambulance service that transported dozens of patients to specialized medical centers. He built a plane from scratch in his mid 80's.

He continues to be an important figure and inspiration to Bouchard Industries. We strive to be as accomplished, positive, driven, audacious and passionate about what we do, just like Dr Savoie. Just as he built a plane from scratch, we believe building a phone from scratch is a fitting way to honor his legacy.