Talk:Linkabit

Just a few words to say that the description of Linkabit on this sight significantly understates the impact it had on the telecommunications business. I can find no sources/references for most of what I am about to recount, but it is based on personal observation and experience. In 1978-79 I was working as a program manager for Motorola Government Systems Division, with responsibility for selected space communications hardware and small aperture ground-based satellite communication systems. We did custom systems for special government programs, very program and application specific. We had a distinct advantage in our sister division designed, developed, tested and built large scale custom integrated circuits, including some very small production runs. For example, a guy down the hall from me had one office wall covered with a drawing of a very large integrated circuit that was being developed by our commercial division for a new thingy called a cell phone. Another program had an overlap with my program area, in that we were working together to develop a highly integrated complete set of electronics for a small aperture satcom terminal, with the objective of getting everything electronic needed to receive downlinks and transmit uplinks in a one cubic foot box. His contract (with the Department of State) was for several satcom terminals to be deployed in extremely rugged terrain, and had many special requirements. Although the program was not technically classified, it was characterized as "close hold," and there was no publicity about it. The satcom terminals were to be delivered to various highly remote places, installed, tested, and become operational, requiring very infrequent maintenance. Turned out that one really big problem was this: Finding the geosat to hook up with. Back then, there were no small portable computers, spectrum analyzers or similar gear. Aligning a 10-meter dish with large amounts of support equipment could take a long time. Aligning a small aperture terminal in remote rugged conditions was a challenge, especially if you were not sure exactly where you were (pre GPS) and not exactly sure where the satellite was. While various people were thrashing around trying to figure out how to do this, somehow someone came in with information on a new idea that might help. There was this little company called Link-a-bit (about 15 employees, if I recall correctly) in San Diego that claimed they had an ideal solution for Motorola's problem. There was a demo arranged, which I did not get to see, where they demonstrated setting up a terminal on (I think) a parking lot, getting the satellite coordinates, pointing roughly to that part of the sky, and getting an immediate connection. Just to demonstrate the relative insensitivity to precise pointing, they let the dish droop and move around without losing the link. This was not a trivial thing; it was a serious breakthrough. This was, of course, the first (so far as I know) significant application of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA). It is my opinion that CDMA was a major breakthrough, and the development of it is a major satcom/telecom event that should be noted in any discussion of electronics history.

As a bit of follow-up: Sometime later Link-a-bit approached Motorola wanting to know if there was any interest in Motorola buying them out. The price (again, relying on a bad memory) was something like $15 million. The Motorola VP decided not to buy them. You have to remember that in 1978-79, there were still a very small amount of small aperture satcom terminals, and a very fuzzy view of the future. Cell phones were just getting started, the requirements for cell phones were being dictated by AT&T, and TDMA and 64 bit full duplex voice were hard, fast, non-negotiable requirements. I found out later that Link-a-bit was bought by MA/com, moved to Boston, and later the key people returned to San Diego to found Qualcomm. Turns out they did not assign the CDMA patents to MA/com, but kept them in their names. This was a really good move on their part. However, it is fun to imagine what might have happened if Motorola had bought them, and gotten the CDMA patents. I am sure that this was not the worst non-deal in history, but it has to rank right up there.

Xashmead (talk) 21:29, 22 March 2022 (UTC)