C3I: Q-MAC - a tactical comms success | ADM Nov 06

1 November 2006

By Gregor Ferguson

Networks and connectivity are as important to poorer nations and humanitarian relief organisations as they are to the western military powers.

A Perth-based radio manufacturer offers an affordable and effective solution.

The rapid growth of Western Australian tactical radio manufacturer Q-MAC Electronics has been remarkable.

In little over a decade, the company has grown from one engineer who designed a radio in his garage to fill a gap in the market to a major high-technology exporter company with clients in over 100 countries.

Q-MAC's success has been achieved by offering advanced, but practical, radios for a carefully targeted niche market.

From the beginning, the company has designed, developed and marketed quality communication products, perfectly suited to that market, and has stayed ahead of its competitors through constant product innovation.

Today, Q-MAC's product range includes HF and VHF transceivers, antennas, tuners, secure modes and a full range of accessories.

The company's philosophy rests on three pillars - its products must be secure, simple to use and low cost.

Q-MAC Electronics was founded in 1994 by engineer Rod Macduff, a specialist in radio design and cryptography.

His experience as a design engineer with Racal Tacticom in the UK provided him with the skills and know-how to exploit the openings he spotted in the tactical communications market.

Through his time with Racal, Rod developed his technical knowledge of military radios, as well as a good understanding of users' real needs.

Racal's approach was at the time considered novel: most defence contractors focused on the highly sophisticated NATO user market, while Racal designed radios specifically tailored to meet the needs of emerging nations.

Racal's radios were perfectly suited to this market sector.

They were highly robust, contained only essential features and offered crypto security and frequency agility.

Racal offered simple, affordable and practical radios, such as the Panther and Jaguar families, which were in widespread service throughout Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and former Soviet countries.

Despite their success, Racal moved away from this market in the late 1980s, focusing on satellites, telephony and the NATO market.

The simpler Racal tactical radios were no longer available. Macduff saw this gap in the market and believed that there remained considerable potential to supply simple military radios into this neglected sector.

After emigrating to Australia and settling in Perth, Macduff worked as Chief Engineer for Barrett Communications.

This experience gave him valuable insight into how SME organisations operate, building on the technical knowledge gained from working in large-scale defence corporations.

He recognised that Australia has a long history in HF radio communications, given the vast size of the continent, and also boasts two well established HF radio suppliers, Codan and Barrett Communications, both with good international reputations in the NGO and commercial radio sectors.

In 1994, Macduff founded Q-MAC Electronics.

The company successfully secured a WA Innovations Grant to partially fund the design of its first product, the HF-90 HF transceiver.

Weighing only 1kg, Q-MAC's HF-90 remains the smallest high-power HF SSB transceiver on the market today.

Not only is the unit compact, light, robust and simple to operate, but it is also contains sufficient functionality for practical field use.

In October 1995, the HF-90 transceiver received Australian Type Approval, effectively government approval for domestic sales.

Q-MAC's first sale followed soon after. An Australian team operating in PNG required a simple, portable radio and Q-MAC's HF-90 was ideal.

An Australian documentary team even filmed this first radio in use when emergency medical aid was called in to save the life of a PNG villager.

A large order for emergency radio packages for the Fire and Emergency Services Authority of Western Australia represented a breakthrough for the company, with the entire order produced in a one-room factory by a very small team.

Q-MAC was however looking beyond Australian shores from the very beginning.

The company's first export order was to commercial users in China in 1996, followed soon after by sales to military users in Russia and other CIS states.

Early sales of the HF-90 were in portable and vehicle configurations but, at only 1kg, the weight of the transceiver made it an obvious choice for backpack solutions, an under-serviced market segment.

From the completion of the HF-90 Manpack, it was immediately clear that the company had developed a real winner.

Military users revelled in the incredibly light weight pack and, for many, a commercial radio in an olive drab canvas backpack was sufficient.

The Q-MAC Manpack contained all the peripherals required for soldiers on the move, including fold-out solar panels for troops without AC power supplies and DC chargers.

The company's Portable and Manpack systems also proved popular with the United Nations and other NGOs, with Q-MAC's HF-90 becoming the portable HF solution of choice for the humanitarian market.

The HF-90 transceiver is equipped with standard Selective Calling, designed to allow interoperability with other radios widely used by NGOs.

In 1999 Q-MAC's frequency hopping processor was completed.

The HF-90 transceiver now offered highly secure communications to armies from emerging nations and Q-MAC had truly entered the world tactical communication stage.

Until 2001, the company continued to grow by selling its commercial HF-90 product.

Whilst field-proven as very robust, and with early models still in service, customer feedback led to the completion of a HF range, including Manpack, Mobile and Base Station configurations, built to meet military standards.

Q-MAC's HF-90M transceiver is rated to withstand complete immersion, vibration and temperature tests to Mil-Std 810F.

A heavy duty, high power variant was also developed for use in tracked vehicles.

The range now includes a 150W Booster Amplifier, high power automatic tuner, NATO standard whip antenna and provision for anti-vibration shock mounting, combat helmets and combat harnesses.

A 500W High Powered Base Station, designed for national or regional headquarters and embassies, completed Q-MAC's HF range.

The company also developed and patented a special vehicle antenna system designed to overcome the Achilles heel of all HF communications, the skip zone.

The skip zone, traditionally found between 30-150km, refers to the area where groundwave propagation ends and skywave propagation begins.

Between these two points, HF coverage using a whip antenna is very limited or non existent.

With the correct selection of frequency, Q-MAC's ML-91 provides virtually continuous coverage from 0 to 1,000km or more.

The unit offers numerous other benefits, including its covert design.

When the antenna is folded down flat, it looks like an ordinary roof rack, avoiding unwelcome attention.

The ML-91 antenna system is in widespread service with military and paramilitary organisations, and NGOs, and is also highly effective in the world's mountainous regions.

While sales to humanitarian groups have been very healthy, sales of the company's HF products to the military sector have risen sharply in recent years.

Armies and related services worldwide now have HF-90M radios in their inventories.

Given the foundations firmly laid through its HF radio success, the time was right for the company to embark on a new growth path through the development of a second major product, the VHF-90M.

In 2003, Q-MAC secured a government support grant to assist with the development of this new VHF product and three large military sales, to a combined value of $6 million, were secured before full rate production started.

Q-MAC's VHF-90M transceiver is specifically designed for tactical military voice and data applications in short to medium ranges.

Like all Q-MAC transceivers, it is an extremely compact and light weight unit, featuring only essential controls to ensure ease of operation in demanding, mission critical conditions.

The transceiver is available in manportable, vehicle and base station configurations, with both an integrated Docking Station and 50W Booster Amplifier available for added functionality.

The VHF-90M provides digital encryption; frequency hopping; selective, group and broadcast calling; data transmission; and legacy compatibility with PRC-77 style radios.

Today, Q-MAC Electronics is the complete tactical radio supplier.

As well as HF and VHF transceivers, the company supplies frequency hopping, digital encryption, antenna systems and data transmission options.

Q-MAC has won a swag of state and national export and engineering awards including the SME Manufacturers Award in the Australian Export Awards.

The company is ISO 9001:2000 accredited and boasts a reference list that includes military, paramilitary and NGO clients in over 100 countries.

The company operates from a modern factory equipped with all the facilities necessary to design, manufacture, test and service its advanced family of tactical radio systems.

Q-MAC currently employs 30 fulltime staff and, through its Australian suppliers and subcontractors, employs many more down the supply chain.

The company also has an expanding international network of dealers and agents to distribute and service its products.

Q-MAC Electronics has an ambitious and achievable business plan in place and has recently commenced work on the design of its next family of innovative tactical products.

Once again, Q-MAC aims to keep one step ahead of its rivals in the expanding NCW marketplace as a leading international integrated tactical communications supplier.