Our Business
SigNav’s business strategy is to provide positioning, timing and reference frequency solutions for the rapidly expanding wireless/mobile applications market. This segment includes standard mobile base stations and picocells as well as emergent WiMax base stations and consumer femtocells.
Our approach is to offer unique technology solutions that deliver both value and differentiation to our customer base either as standard products or tailored developments. As our markets evolve, so too does the need to encapsulate our technology in appropriate packages. To address today’s needs SigNav supplies modules, micro-modules, or chip scale packages, and integrated circuits, providing our customers with the optimal entry vehicle for their target market and phase of product lifecycle. This flexible approach enables customers to evolve their designs from higher cost prototypes and low volume production runs to low cost and high volume.
Our Strengths
Our patented, market leading GPS technology has been built on a foundation of extensive signal processing and hardware development expertise.
Our Philosophy
- Lead the market with superior technology
- Strive continuously for improved productivity and quality
- Develop long-term relationships with our customers
- Be professional and honest in everything we do
- Be conscious of the environment during all aspects of conducting our business
- Preserve our shareholders’ interests and reward them with continued returns for their investment
- Provide our employees with professionally satisfying and challenging careers
Our Major Investors
SigNav’s major shareholders are Australian venture capital funds:
Our Commitment to Quality
Our commitment to quality is demonstrated by SigNav’s certification to ISO9001:2000 accredited with JAS-ANZ for Australasia, UKAS for UK and ANSI-RAB for USA. Regular audits by Lloyds Register Quality Assurance Limited ensure a company-wide commitment to improved customer satisfaction.
SigNav: A rich heritage in GPS
SigNav’s GPS heritage dates back to 1987, when its nucleus was formed within an Australian subsidiary of Matra-Marconi Space called Auspace Limited. SigNav’s current CEO, Dr Rod Bryant, led the development of the Multinav 5 channel OEM receiver.
In 1994 Dr Bryant formed Sigtec Navigation with major shareholding by Sigtec Pty Ltd and acquired the technology and business of the SatNav Products Div of Auspace. Sigtec is an Australian company specialising in dispatch for taxis and couriers, fleet management and fleet tracking systems. Its equipment has been widely deployed in Australia, UK, USA and Asia. Sigtec Navigation was formed to provide a leading edge, in-house source for GPS tracking technology, a core element for Sigtec’s systems. During this period SigNav gained expertise with field hardened Dead Reckoning and software for sophisticated Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL) subsystems.
Sigtec Navigation entered into a relationship with the pioneering GPS chip-set manufacturer, Mitel (later Zarlink), in 1999. In addition to developing systems based on the Zarlink products, Sigtec Navigation also provided global support for Zarlink’s customers with firmware development kits, hardware design kits and engineering services. Through this association, invaluable experience and know-how was gained servicing applications including GPS timing, precision agriculture, attitude sensing, aviation navigation and asset tracking.
Since 2000, the company has been heavily engaged in the development and deployment of assisted and semi-autonomous GPS firmware. This led to the development of firmware, assistance software and test tools compliant with CDMA and GSM Assisted GPS (AGPS) standards, as well as a proprietary scheme. SigNav’s unique, patented, weak signal processing solution suits a wide variety of assistance models and a wide range of baseband hardware architectures. SigNav has implemented solutions on three different chipset families with acquisition sensitivity down to -187dBW. During this period the company formed an enduring relationship with u-Nav (now part of Atheros Inc).
In April 2004, Sigtec Navigation was spun out as an independent company now known as SigNav Pty Ltd. In December of that year SigNav won a $3.06 Million Dollar research and development (START) grant from the Australian Government’s Department of Industry, Science and Tourism to maintain its position at the forefront of GPS technology. This was used along with matching internal funds to research and develop technology and products to provide low cost clocking, timing and location for wireless base stations, picocells and femtocells.
Since then SigNav has established itself as a leading supplier of GPS solutions for the femtocell and WiMax base station markets with field proven micro-modules utilising customised silicon from its long term IC partner, Atheros Inc. SigNav’s micro-modules are already deployed in many tens of thousands of femtocells in USA and SigNav’s customers are leading vendors of femtocells and WiMax base stations based in Korea, USA, UK and India. SigNav offers modules and micro-modules for lower volume applications and fast time to market and GPS chips with reference designs and firmware for lower cost high volume applications.