Inmarsat Partner Podcast with Rugged Logic
At the SATELLITE 2019 Conference in Washington, D.C. we sat down with Andrew Yoder, Ph.D., President and Chief Executive Officer at Rugged Logic, specializing in the design and manufacturing of communication, power and sensor systems for remote use in environmentally harsh conditions, to discuss its successful partnership with Inmarsat in the U.S. government market and other industry issues. We are pleased to have this relationship in place with Rugged Logic as we constantly strive to identify and join forces with value-add terminal manufacturers to leverage the best technology that commercial industry has to offer and develop innovative hardware solutions built to government users’ requirements.
Mr. Yoder sat down with us to share a few thoughts on why the partnership with Inmarsat is so strong and how it benefits government customers. “We have a high level of trust in Inmarsat as they allow us to do what we are good at (terminals). They are always trying to innovate to ensure that our users get the best possible service to meet their needs in any type of environment – working together we complement each other.” Also in this video podcast discussion you will gain an understanding of the importance Rugged Logic and Inmarsat put on the type approval process. Every terminal is tested at a third-party facility to make sure they meet all aircraft requirements from vibration profiles to temperature ranges. In addition, Mr. Yoder discusses their ongoing supply chain evaluations and testing to make sure every terminal that goes out the door is reliable. Importantly, he points out that Inmarsat has done a fantastic job of creating a suite of services where users do not have to worry about setup or maintenance of the link, and that this automation is key to allowing customers to focus on their mission.
To learn more about Inmarsat Government’s partnership with Rugged Logic watch the full podcast below. Satellite terminals form part of the high-performance and all-time assured quality provided by Inmarsat services. Inmarsat works closely with its industry-leading value-add manufacturers, like Rugged Logic, to deliver best-in-class, Inmarsat type-approved terminal solutions built to users’ requirements. To guarantee this experience, Inmarsat requires all of its terminal manufacturers to complete a rigorous design and acceptance test process to ensure the highest standards of quality and performance of its systems.
Transcript
What makes this partnership with Inmarsat successful?
So in our partnership with Inmarsat, we’ve experienced a high level of trust. They allow us to do what we’re good at, and on their side, they’re always trying to innovate in terms of the services aspects to ensure that the users get the best service and meet their needs for whatever their environment is. So working together, we complement each other.
What are the benefits your Inmarsat type-approved terminal solutions bring to government customers?
The terminals are tested at a third-party facility where we, of course, unbiased, have a vendor that will take our terminals through MIL standard 810G testing, specialty testing for aircraft. A lot of times there are specific vibration profiles and temperature ranges that they have to test to. Drones are particularly difficult, but we test everything to ensure that these terminals are going to work reliably on these planes and vehicles.
As a trusted, value-added manufacturer, how does your company address supply chain management?
Every year, we go through a review process of all of our vendors. We evaluate them, always looking for new vendors to help us do things better. And even though we do trust our vendors and do a good job of vetting them, we follow that up with testing to ensure that every terminal that goes out the door is reliable.
Our government customers are typically occupied with other things besides keeping their satellite link up and running. So Inmarsat has done a fantastic job of creating a suite of services where they don’t have to worry about setup or maintenance of the link. And this automation is key in them doing the other things that they’re supposed to be doing.
In three words, how would your government end users describe their xperience with your company?
If our government customers could describe us in three words, I think the first word they would use would be responsive. Not all the time are all your needs known upfront in a program. As engineers, we love to believe that will happen, but sometimes midway through the program, something’s discovered that needs to be adjusted. And we do a really good job of responding to those needs. The second two words I think I would use would be reliable and rugged. Of course, rugged is in our name, and reliable is of utmost importance to us since our users have critical needs and are so important. We need to provide terminals that are reliable in the worst environmental conditions.
Can you share an example of one of your proudest deployments/contracts using Inmarsat Services?
So one of our proudest achievements has been for a customer we had who had a very important mission for their aircraft. They had a solution that was very complex. There were pieces of software managing other pieces of software from different companies. So we came into the program with Inmarsat, and of course, Inmarsat’s global Express Network was able to solve a lot of those problems. We were able to get the program up and flying in about nine months, and it has been very, very successful and running for over a year without any issues.
