Mission Microwave has teamed with an industry leading, system integrator that is supporting a U.S. Government (USG) requirement and has won a significant terminal upgrade program contract ($8 million) that replaces Traveling Wave Tube Amplifiers (TWTA) with High Performance, Lightweight, Solid State Power Amplifiers (SSPA) in Ku- and Ka-band.
Mission Microwave engineers worked with their customer to create an upgrade path for the USG to replace legacy TWTA based BUCs with state-of-the-art, Solid State BUCs, based on Gallium Nitride (GaN) technology, for the customer’s fleet of widely deployed, transportable terminals. The initial upgrades started in late 2019 and, prior to this recent award, more than 100 sets of Ku- and Ka-band BUCs have been delivered to Mission Microwave’s customer on the program.
Mission Microwave is providing 200 Watt Ka-Band and 400 Watt Ku-band BUCs to replace legacy TWTA based Upconverters. Mission Microwave’s industry leading competency in designing compact and highly efficient amplifiers has enabled their customer to offer an upgrade path that will extend the life and improve the utility of this tactical SATCOM terminal fleet.
“The end-users of our products rely on SATCOM system providers to bring the benefits of Solid State designs to the tactical edge. We worked with our customers’ engineering team to navigate the complexities of the upgrade and certification process for these terminals. We expect the established trend of replacing high power TWTA’s with SSPA’s to be a significant market for the foreseeable future, led by our recent additions of 400 watt Ka-band and 800 watt X-band BUCs to our product line,” said Steve Richeson, Vice President of Sales & Marketing for Mission Microwave
Mission Microwave Technologies continues to be at the forefront of the satellite terminal industry in shipping high power X-, Ku- and Ka-band BUCs from 8 to 800 watts for critical applications in ground, maritime and aerospace applications. Mission’s customers support government and commercial industry sectors that require high efficiency, reliability and performance. Mission brings revolutionary design for RF (Radio Frequency) and microwave electronics, using the latest in semiconductor technology. Mission’s focus is to minimize the size, weight, and power (SWaP) for these critical applications while providing its customers with the best possible reliability.
