Rohde & Schwarz — BrandWiki

Rohde & Schwarz

Overview

Rohde & Schwarz GmbH & Co KG

type	Private
foundation	17
founders	Lothar Rohde Hermann Schwarz
location	Munich, Germany
key people	Christian Leicher, President & CEO, Markus Fischer, COO, Andreas Pauly, CTO ‡R1R‡
num employees	more than 15,000 (FY 2024/25)‡R1R‡
revenue	€3.16 billion (FY 2024/25)‡R1R‡
website	rohde-schwarz.com

Rohde & Schwarz GmbH & Co. KG is a German multinational electronics group specializing in the fields of electronic test equipment, broadcast & media, cybersecurity, radiomonitoring and radiolocation, and radiocommunication. The company also provides products for wireless communications, the electronics industry, aerospace and defense, homeland security and critical infrastructures.

In addition to the Munich headquarters, there are regional headquarters in the United States (Columbia, Maryland) and in Asia (Singapore). Worldwide the company has a total of more than 15,000 employees[1] in over 70 countries.

History

PTE and World War 2

The company was founded by Lothar Rohde and Hermann Schwarz who met while studying physics in Jena. They built their first T&M instrument in 1932, and in August 1933, the Physikalisch-Technisches Entwicklungslabor Dr. Rohde & Dr. Schwarz (known as PTE) started in business.

Products

With its three Test & Measurement, Technology Systems and Networks & Cybersecurity divisions the company generated net revenue of EUR 2.93 billion in the 2023/24 fiscal year.[11]

R&S subsidiary for oscilloscopes HAMEG was producing the standard testing equipment for companies, schools and universities in Germany. In 2010, Rohde & Schwarz launched the world's first oscilloscope with a digital trigger.[12]

More than 200 airports deploy Rohde & Schwarz radiocommunications systems. In 2011, the company began selling voice communications systems for air traffic control (ATC). These systems are based on a product from Topex SA, a company in which Rohde & Schwarz acquired a majority interest in 2010.[13]

Rohde & Schwarz SIT GmbH develops crypto products and systems for government agencies, the German armed forces, authorities, the military and private industry. The subsidiary's high-security encryption technology is used for both wireless and wireline communications. As early as 2001, Rohde & Schwarz SIT launched the world's first crypto phone TopSec GSM.[14]

IT-Network technology and cybersecurity

R&S provides product families for secure communication via WAN-, LAN- and WiFi-networks for business and state authorities.

Military SIGINT, ELINT and EW technology

R&S provides ELINT systems for comprehensive intelligence gathering capability especially for modern radar signals. Digital wideband recording preserves all signal properties such as instantaneous amplitude, frequency and phase and detects also frequency-modulated continuous wave (FMCW) radars and solid-state radars operating at very low power level.[15]

Radio communication networks for armed forces

R&S supplies interoperable radio communication systems for military, government and civilian use. Like its competitor Thales, Elbit etc, the company develops software-defined radio devices (SDR). At R&S, radio and telecommunications reconnaissance have always been the highest-earning business areas with a small number of customers.

SOVERON

Soveron is a family of SDR radios for military tactical communication, developed by R&S. The radios work at HF, UHF and VHF spectrums and are based on an internationally common Software Communications Architecture standard with backward compatibility. The frequency spectrum ranges from 30 to 600 MHz; simultaneous transmission of voice and data in each radio channel with up to two voice channels is possible. The "Transect" fast frequency hopping technology provides robustness against jamming attacks. For bandwidth efficient voice compression is a MELPe codec used.[16] Soveron is already used by a number of NATO and non-NATO forces.[17]

When the Russian war of aggression on Ukraine started in 2022, the German government under Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) decided on an off-budget fund ("Sondervermögen") for fitting of German armed forces for example by a state of the art command and information system. Rohde & Schwarz was awarded the contract for 2.9 billion EUR in 2022 for Armed Forces Joint Connected Radio Equipment (Streitkräftegemeinsame verbundfähige Funkausstattung (SVFuA)) andis delivering its Soveron program to Bundeswehr. Public known users of Soveron beside Bundeswehr are the Portuguese Army, the Canadian Armed Forces and an unidentified Asian armed force.

There are significant problems with the introduction of the Soveron system in the German Armed Forces. Tests of the system showed that it is too complex for use in, for example, main battle tanks and under combat conditions, where simple and reliable operation under stress and time-critical situations is required.[18]

A second issue is the physical incompatibility of the devices with the approximately 200 different vehicles used by the German Armed Forces. The Soveron radios are too large and too heavy for many of the intended vehicles. A major problem is that the battery capacity of many vehicles is insufficient to power the energy-intensive digital radio stations. The alternators are too weak for the Soveron devices. In some vehicles, modifications to the cooling system are even necessary to cope with the additional heat generated by the digital systems.[19]

Rohde & Schwarz

History

PTE and World War 2

Internationalisation after 1945

Since 2000

Products

IT-Network technology and cybersecurity

Military SIGINT, ELINT and EW technology

Radio communication networks for armed forces

Customers

External links

References

SOVERON

SOVERON

Civil analytic and electronic test equipment for microwave and HF

Broadcast technology

Body scanner