Jose Torres, Global Sales Director of longtime iDirect partner Integrasys, sat down with us to discuss his company’s latest move to a U.S. office and what’s coming next for the company, which specializes in engineering and manufacturing Satellite Spectrum Monitoring Systems in the telecommunication and broadcasting markets.
There’s a lot going on at Integrasys right now. What’s driving your growth?
Jose: Growth started with Satmotion Pocket, the best VSAT auto-commissioning system in the market. It created a lot of attention in the industry — particularly with our partners, because with it we can help make end users’ lives easier in terms of how they commission antennas and install them.
Plus, we’re always launching new systems and products. We launched Alusat, a VSAT maintenance system, two years ago. We also just launched two new products recently. One is Beam Budget, which is a link budget tool that allows you to size your network and perform link budgets in an easier way. Link budgets historically are very complicated, but anyone can use our link budget tool and run their own budgets. This comes in handy, particularly when you’re in a fast-paced environment and you need to run calculations fairly quickly, for performing customer quotes and addressing more business.
The second is a new Satmotion API, which is the next generation of Satmotion. It allows you to do the pointing and commissioning of antennas without having an installer on-site. However, it is not available for flat panel antennas and communications on the move (COTM).
Would you say an overall trend is to simplify the more technical aspects of satellite?
Jose: Exactly, and that’s what Integrasys does. We always emphasize that concept to customers and partners because the satellite industry, products and services can get very complex. Our systems and tools allow you to accomplish what you’re trying to do in an easier and faster way, becoming much more effective. We focus on adding new features and upgrading existing products to make sure customers can use them without any technical difficultly. We want the learning curve to be as short as possible, so you don’t have to spend all your time on learning and training, and you can use our products right away.
Why is this so important?
Jose: As you know, time is money. When there’s a network that needs to be deployed, particularly in the VSAT world where you have hundreds of sites, you want to do it as quickly as possible and in the most optimal manner. You’ve seen networks that take a long time to be deployed and, in some cases, they run into a lot of technical issues because they don’t have the tools or systems to do it. Our systems allow end users to do it easier and faster, so that their return on investment is right there.
What markets do you see driving growth in the industry right now?
Jose: We’ve seen a large increase in demand in maritime. We’re starting to see more interest in the aero market. We’re also continuing to support fixed sites. There’s a lot of demand as well with 5G coming. It’s still unknown exactly how it’ll be deployed, but it’s creating demand. There are new satellites being launched — LEO and MEO — that will be able to provide IoT services, so we’re focusing on those new applications. The government market is growing as well. We’re now closely working with iDirect Government to support some of their customers. It’s another market we’re targeting and where we see a lot of growth.
Is the Herndon location your first U.S. location?
Jose: The company started 29 years ago in Spain. We have another office in Seville where we do a lot of R&D, especially ad hoc development. We now have a new office here in Herndon, Virginia, which is in the Washington, D.C. area and across the street from iDirect, which is a strategic location for us. As we all know, D.C. is great because there’s a lot of satellite operators and companies in the area.
We have a new systems engineer and a new network lab in our Herndon office. We have one iDirect Velocity® hub and one Evolution® hub installed in this lab, which allows us to do a lot of testing. We’re now very close to launching the new Satmotion for iDirect Velocity. We’re very excited because this is something we’ve been working on since last year.
What are you showcasing at SATELLITE 2019?
Jose: We’re promoting the new link budget tool, Beam Budget, and One Touch Commissioning and Satmotion API. We’re also going to show our existing systems, like ControlSat, Satmotion Pocket, Alusat, Vectorsat, etc. We’re going to be announcing our new developments on Satmotion Pocket for iDirect Velocity and Satmotion API. We like to showcase demos of our products in our booth so feel free to stop by Booth #101.
Jose Torres is the Global Sales Director at Integrasys. He joined the company in April 2018, bringing with him more than 25 years of experience working on both the operator and equipment vendor side of the satellite industry. Before Integrasys, Torres held positions at Hughes and Comtech EF Data. Jose is married and has one daughter and one son, and Jose likes to play soccer with them.