A Reading-based space technology company that designs flat satellite antennas able to talk to several satellites at once, with no moving parts.
Isotropic Systems designs satellite antennas that can link to more than one satellite at a time. A normal dish points at a single satellite, but as new fleets of satellites in different orbits arrive, one antenna may need to pick up several. The company's answer is a design using patented lens technology that bends radio waves, so the antenna needs no moving parts to follow a satellite. Its terminals are described as multi-beam, multi-link and all-orbit. The idea is make-before-break connectivity: the terminal connects to a rising satellite before it lets go of one that is leaving. The company hoped to make such antennas cheap enough for aircraft, ships and buses.
Founder and chief executive John Finney has a background in optics and telecoms. He began work in 2013 after seeing that the growing number of satellite frequencies would create what he called a big antenna problem, as he told Sifted. The company's mission, as described there, is to solve the satellite industry's antenna problem and open up wider use of satellites by making high-performance receivers affordable. It has more than seven published patents and has had contracts with the US Army and Navy, and it worked with SES on tests of multi-orbit services.
Isotropic is headquartered in Reading, Berkshire, and in 2021 was building a new engineering and testing facility nearby, expected to employ about 220 people. A Payload article from April 2022 said the team had doubled over the previous year, with a 130th hire recently signed, and that it expected to double again. Hiring then was focused on manufacturing and software development. Some listings describe the firm as London-based, but the Reading base is the one named in the 2021-2022 articles we read.
The articles do not describe the company's culture. They suggest a fast-growing technology start-up, with a mix of optics, radio-frequency, software and manufacturing staff, and a chief marketing officer, Brian Billman, and a senior vice president of engineering, John-Paul Szczepanik, who joined from Phasor. The first customers were mainly government and defence users, who value resilience, plus connectivity for cellular backhaul, flights and tactical vehicles. Production terminals were reported sold out for the rest of 2022. These are details from 2021 and 2022, so they are dated.
Jobs at a company like this include antenna and RF engineers, optical and materials specialists, software developers, test engineers, manufacturing and production staff, supply-chain planners and sales and marketing colleagues. Physics, electronics, engineering and computing lead in. Because the sources are two to three years old and we could not confirm the company's current activity, check carefully on its website and recent news before you make any plans around it.
Website: www.isotropicsystems.com
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