RENO, NV--(Marketwire - February 14, 2011) - DockOn, Inc., the developer of the first commercially viable planar compound antennas, today announced compact, omni-directional, circular polarized antennas in a variety of frequencies that offer flexibility for non-standard application orientation. Easily manufactured on FR4 or other materials, CPL Antenna Elements can be manufactured using common, inexpensive, high-volume production techniques. These newest additions to the CPL Antenna family offer planar antennas with superb performance for a variety of devices and applications that require antennas with a circular polarization.
CPL antennas are the first commercially viable compound planar antennas that utilize both magnetic loop radiators and co-located electric field radiators. Conventional antenna technologies typically excite either electric or magnetic radiators, but not both. This simultaneous excitation of both radiators results in an effective cancellation of reactive power, improving the overall performance and efficiency. Total efficiency measured in the 90 percent range is common in CPL antenna designs.
At 402 MHz, Microcom Design of Hunt Valley, MD used a DockOn circular polarized CPL antenna element to dramatically improve performance while decreasing the size of its next generation of satellite receiver antennas.
"It was Microcom's objective to develop a small UHF RHCP antenna with low cost construction methods, improved performance and smaller size to use with our line of Environmental Data Collection Products," said Duane Preble, Vice President, Microcom Design. "The antenna uses a 10 inch back plane with a 3 inch X 8 inch ABS radome cover. Partnering with DockOn has brought this about using their unique Compound Antenna technology. DockOn has good command of the engineering and science required to make such a design. We look forward to further evolving this design in this and other projects."
Embedded RFID application provider, Thinkify, offers DockOn's antennas with linear polarization as an accessory to its latest line of RFID readers, and has seen new customer demand for readers that offer flexibility for tag orientation.
"The new circular polarization option provides us with the ability to tackle even more difficult RFID use-cases where the tag orientation relative to the antenna is unknown or uncontrolled," said Dr. John Price, Co-founder, Thinkify. "For a wide variety of RFID applications like document control, you cannot guarantee the orientation of the tag -- they can be scattered all over the work area. The circular polarization and relatively high gain characteristics of DockOn's new product provides a tremendous advantage in system performance and read accuracy."
The CPL Antenna technology and development environment allows customers to bring unique requirements to DockOn and receive rapid feedback on the feasibility of their project. Within hours or days, DockOn is able to present a feasibility study and prototypes for testing. Often knowing just the frequency and desired size is enough to produce a prototype in just hours or days. Thus, with DockOn's new line of circular polarized antennas, customers enjoy total design freedom by receiving an affordable, completely custom antenna to complement their specific design objectives.
"For applications such as outdoor campus-wide Wi-Fi or Metropolitan Area Networks, the flexibility of a circular polarized antenna is something that has not been available at this price point in such a small, planar format until now. For these reasons, we anticipate that this line will be the most rapidly adopted yet," said Patrick Johnston, DockOn's CEO.
DockOn is the first antenna design company to develop and utilize a unique global design collaboration software tool which serves to:
- Quickly provide customers with real answers about their RF design (sometimes instantly)
- Automate antenna design in simulation
- Store collaborative antenna designs to a central database
- Provide access to a wealth of antenna design information to internal or external design teams
Samples of the new circular polarized antennas are currently available in the 402 MHz, 915 MHz, and 2.4 GHz frequencies.
Additional Resources
Microcom Design
Thinkify
DockOn
Microstrip Compound Antennas Whitepaper
About DockOn
DockOn is a cutting edge antenna design company which offers its customers faster development times using a breakthrough antenna technology offering superior wireless performance custom made to meet unique and demanding requirements.
© 2010 DockOn, Inc. All rights reserved. DockOn®, the DockOn logo, CPL™ and the names and marks associated with DockOn's products are trademarks of DockOn, Inc. and are registered and/or common law marks in the United States.
Contact Information:
CONTACT:
Holly LaRocco
Connect Public Relations
(801) 373-7888