Our story started to take shape in 2015, when my father, who had already been a beekeeper for several years, started thinking about a hive scale. At the time, their prices were around 300 EUR and more. Yes, they had a GSM module and a display, but for a small home beekeeper with an apiary next to the house it was unnecessarily complicated. As a student of electrical engineering and software engineering, I could only shake my head. Whether at the price, which at the time meant almost half a monthly salary, or the complicated setup through SMS like something from the 1990s. But above all at the outdated display on the scale instead of a graph on your phone, which you always have with you.
A year or two passed, but my father kept returning to the idea. In 2017, as a hobby, I started building such a scale. I already had practical programming experience, so what remained was to learn more about hardware.
After a few evenings of tinkering, the first prototype was born. Bluetooth communication, graphs in the eHive app. It quickly became clear, however, that the accuracy of the sensors used was poor: high drift, strong temperature dependence. Nothing usable.
I put the idea aside for a few months, but during the following winter I came back to it. After several days of searching on the internet, I managed to find sensors that claimed sufficient accuracy at a reasonable price. The results were promising. The scale went into testing and my father was satisfied.
But there was still a long list of things to finish: app stability, firmware, battery life, mounting of the electronics and so on...
My father's enthusiasm lasted and he mentioned the scale to a few acquaintances. They found it unbelievable that something like this could be built at home just like that. They immediately said they wanted one too and asked how much it would cost.
Rough calculations showed that the introductory price could stay under 100 EUR. I said to myself: why not, I have already spent so much time on it. It will help others and at least my costs will come back.
So at the end of 2018 I founded a company and started small-batch production alongside my regular job, without big ambitions. It was enough for me that I had managed to get from an idea to a product. The scales went on sale in March 2019.
Over the years, small details were refined: fixing edge cases in the firmware, tuning the app, simplifying production. Customers were satisfied and started asking about a GSM module. During the year I decided to develop it and from the 2020 season it was available.
The start was great. Alongside my main job, it was possible to handle everything without a problem until the situation at home changed. We started a family and it turned out that our daughter has a disability. Caring for her took time and energy. There was little room left for production and development. Walking away from the project felt unfair, both to customers and to myself. After all, it is my passion. So my wife and I agreed to slow the activity down for a few years and come back to it fully when there was more time.
This year it happened. We are entering the 2026 season with a new website, a new app and a new generation of scales.
If you ever get an email or a phone call from an eHive number, you are talking to us, to the people who designed it, assembled it, tested it on their own hives and understand it from A to Z.
David Pacura, eHive
We build eHive in Sedliacka Dubova in Orava. We are not a big company and we do not want to become one. Not because we are afraid to grow, but because small-batch production gives us something we would lose in mass production: direct contact with the customer, the ability to stand behind the product even after years, and the ability to innovate quickly.
If you send an email or call, the person answering is the same person who designed and builds eHive. Not an operator reading from a screen, not an automated reply with a ticket number.
In practice, that means even a non-standard problem does not require a special process. It is enough to describe what is happening. Bugs are fixed almost immediately. A small bug in the app can be fixed within a few tens of minutes. And if a customer suggests an improvement that makes sense, it can get into the product within a few days, not into a backlog where it disappears.
Over the years, customers helped us uncover things that testing did not catch: edge cases in firmware, problems with reading data in specific conditions, small details in the construction itself. Every such input was handled directly by the person who designed it.
A hive scale is not a disposable product. It stands outside, in every kind of weather, year after year. Something will eventually fail, and that is exactly when it matters that it can be repaired.
Because we keep the whole system in our own hands, mechanics, electronics, firmware and the app, we can offer service and refurbishment even after years. Spare parts are available. It is not a promise. It is the natural result of the fact that none of it is made by someone else for us.
The scale is designed in a modular way: the sensor part on the frame is separate from the control electronics and the battery holder. In practice, that means a failure does not require replacing the whole scale. Often one module is enough. And when Bluetooth communication becomes outdated one day, it will be enough to replace one box and everything will continue to work.
From a long-term perspective, repair makes more sense than buying a new device. And we have the capacity for that precisely because we produce in small batches and know every unit.
Building an eHive scale is not just assembling parts. It is a sequence of connected steps where each one matters for the result. We buy the base components, electronic parts, material for the frames and printed circuit boards. Everything else we do here in Sedliacka Dubova in Orava.
We machine the frames on a small CNC machine. The reason is similar to 3D printing: we can quickly change the shape and construction without expensive reprogramming. It also lets us do things that would otherwise be difficult, such as routing the cabling directly into the frame, which simplifies both assembly and the final design.
Plastic parts, covers, holders and bushings, are made with 3D printing. It lets us quickly change the shape, strength and material during development while also keeping spare parts available even for older generations of scales.
We assemble the PCB through a solder paste stencil and bake it in a reflow oven. The result is even and repeatable soldering without cold joints. After baking comes visual inspection, startup of the board by uploading the firmware, and a functional check to verify that the accuracy and stability of the load cell measurement are correct.
This is a step most manufacturers do not do at all. We test every load cell in a thermal chamber across the full operating temperature range.
Why? The planar sensors used in bhScale have a reputation among competitors for worse temperature stability. Reported drift is often 30 to 50 g per °C. And they are right, because manufacturing variability is high. A sensor that measures correctly at room temperature may start to show drift under load, continuous measurement and changing temperature, an apparent weight change that has nothing to do with what is really happening in the hive. By testing every unit in the thermal chamber, we can detect and reject sensors that would cause problems in the field. Together with software compensation, we achieve drift of only 10 g per °C, significantly better than what is common for planar sensors. The result is direct: the changes you see in the graph reflect what is really happening in the hive, not fluctuations in ambient temperature.
We develop the whole software chain internally. Firmware, the program running directly in the scale's microcontroller, the app for Windows, Android and iOS, and even the web server. One team, one responsibility.
The practical consequence is simple: when a mobile operator changes network behaviour, when Android releases a new version, or when a customer discovers an edge case that testing did not catch, we can fix it quickly without depending on an external supplier.
After assembly comes the functional test and calibration. Calibration is the moment when mechanics and electronics become a measuring instrument. We verify weight measurement accuracy, communication and stability under load. Every scale leaves with its own calibration coefficient that reflects the properties of its sensors.
The scale is designed in a modular way: the sensor part on the frame is separate from the control electronics and the battery holder. For us, that simplifies manufacturing and combining different variants. For you, it is an advantage during service. In case of failure, the whole scale does not need to be replaced.
For a device to be sold legally, it is not enough that it measures well. We handle compliance requirements, safety, EMC and the radio part for Bluetooth and the GSM module. These are things the customer does not see in everyday use, but without them the product is not a product in the legal sense.
In practice, that means documented procedures, traceable production changes and the discipline that small-batch production must consciously maintain.
Because we have the whole production chain, from mechanics to the server, in our own hands, we can stand behind the product even after years. Service, refurbishment and spare parts are a natural consequence of knowing the system in detail.
If you choose eHive, there is someone behind it whom you can still contact five years from now.