Communications Research Centre Canada and SkyWave Mobile Communications Inc.

Technology Transfer Award

For the successful development, transfer and commercialization of an omni-directional antenna that led to the creation of one of the world's largest satellite-based mobile asset tracking systems

---

Communications Research Centre Canada (CRC) is the kind of world-class leader that a fledgling satellite telematics company with big ambitions and a product design problem turns to for help. That’s precisely what SkyWave Mobile Communications Inc. did in 1997 when the Ottawa-based company applied for a spot in the CRC Innovation Centre incubation program that offers high technology start-up companies on-site access to federal laboratories and research expertise. Over the next three years, SkyWave engineers worked on the design of its prototype satellite terminals alongside CRC’s antenna research group, which developed a compact, omni-directional antenna that was critical to the technology’s ability to monitor and communicate the position of vehicles and vessels by satellite. 

Since then, SkyWave has established itself as the global leader in two-way satellite telematics products and services. One of the world’s largest satellite-based mobile asset tracking systems, SkyWave terminals with their dual patch antenna can pinpoint the exact location of fixed or moving objects on a map accessed over the Internet. Used in a wide variety of civilian and military applications including security and supervisory control, the technology developed at the CRC facility has created 80 jobs while the company’s subsequent products have generated sales totaling more than $50 million in an export-driven market. 

Team Members

Michel Cuhaci
Nicolas Gagnon
Aldo Petosa
Communications Research Centre Canada

Doug Reveler
Peter Rossiter
Vadim Volinski
SkyWave Mobile Communications Inc.