UNION Engineering

UNION Engenharia de Telemática is a company created by seniors Engineers with solid technical background and with great professional experience and expertise in the Telecommunications area, devoted to develop wireless and satellite networks and business opportunities in Brazil.

 

UNION Engineers and Technicians are pioneers in Brazil in the satellite communications and wireless communications arena, being actively involved - since the first technical-economical evaluations to start of operations, going through design, implementation and tests - of Telecommunications and Informatics projects that changed dramatically the communications history in Brazil, from which the following can be highlighted:

  • 􏰀  The Brazilian Domestic Satellite System, including business plan, negotiations with ITU, coordination with neighboring countries and contract with services providers and equipment manufacturers;

  • 􏰀  Development of relationships with the INTELSAT and INMARSAT systems;

  • 􏰀  Work with the Minister of Communications of the Brazilian Government to develop standards for

    several services, like private satellite communications and paging service provision

  • 􏰀  The SISCOMIS, the Brazilian Military Satellite Communications System, consisting of satellite communications through X band on Brasilsat satellites, terrestrial digital radio links and fiber optical links, including discussions with the Minister of Communications for frequency band clearance and technical / economic studies to define the technology with best cost-benefit ratio.

  • 􏰀  Design and implementation of the first paging network of Brazil, the nationwide TELETRIM system, including all legal aspects related to national and state Government authorization.

  • 􏰀  Design, for GTECH Corporation, USA, of the first on-line cellular radio-based lottery network in Brazil, for the cities of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Brasília, Belo Horizonte and Curitiba, including satellite links for connection with a central Main Data Center. This work involved all negotiations and paper filings in the Ministry of Communications for definition of operation frequency band and service authorization.

  • 􏰀  Participation on the economic analysis evaluation (business plan), design of payload configuration, typical link budget elaboration and preparation of documents for ITU, for the first Brazilian private domestic satellite system, the CLASS System (Companhia Latino-Americana de Serviços via Satélite).

  • 􏰀  Dimensioning and design of the space segment and terrestrial segment for TELEMAR, the largest Brazilian fixed telephony operator, including coverage definition, payload / bus technical characteristics elaboration and ITU documents. Space segment is a multi-beam, multi task satellite, C/Ku band and terrestrial network consist of 8 hubs and 470 small to medium size earth stations spread over the north, northeast and east regions of Brazil.

  • 􏰀  Design of integrated multi-applications private satellite communications networks for corporations, based on multi-services integrated platforms, were the satellite network is seen by the user as an IP cloud. They encompass open protocol digital broadband transmission, using resource optimization techniques as DAMA / BoD (Demand Assigned Multiple Access / Bandwidth on Demand)

  • Those solutions allow scarce satellite network resources sharing among several diverse applications, from low traffic legacy applications to high capacity data transmission; from voice / video signals 􏰁 very sensitive to variation on propagation delay - to digital data, in this case sensitive to response time.

    • 􏰀  Studies, definition and elaboration of specifications of the Brazilian SBAS (Satellite Based Augmentation System) for air traffic control, based on the use of specific payloads on GEO satellites aiming to increase GPS positioning system accuracy and reliability.

    • 􏰀  Active participation on the capacity study, definition of applications, system design and technical specifications elaboration of the first Brazilian Government Satellite, the SGDC (Satélite Geossíncrono Brasileiro de Defesa e Comunicações Estratégicas 􏰁 Brazilian Defense and Strategic Communications Geosynchronous Satellite).

      UNION professionals were also responsible for the design and implementation of several private satellite communications networks, including the first VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) network installed in Brazil for a telecom service provider after privatization (with two Hubs - large size central earth station in a star topology - and about 1200 small size remote earth stations).

      Recently, with the revival of petrol/gas business in Brazil, UNION have been involved with Petrobras and other foreign oil/gas exploration companies in specific communications network design (SCADA, corporate networks, communications 􏰁 aeronautical, maritime and private 􏰁 networks on maritime platforms and FPSOs ), evaluation of intrinsically safety equipment certified by Anatel (the Brazilian Telecom regulatory agency) and work with the Agency for obtaining the required licenses and operations authorization.

      In the development of the above-mentioned activities, the following tasks were accomplished:

      • 􏰀  Business plan and legal evaluation of new services or networks being introduced, in light of present and new legislation and local market conditions and potential development;

      • 􏰀  General network design (including definition of terrestrial access through optical fibber or radio, dimensioning of multiplex and PABX equipment and dimensioning of power and air conditioning facilities);

      • 􏰀  Coordination studies (in the case of spectrum sharing with terrestrial networks);

      • 􏰀  Work with the government authorities to obtain authorization for service provision;

      • 􏰀  Support on equipment and system installation and testing;

      • 􏰀  Engineering training;

      • 􏰀  Planning and implementation of a customer support structure, including establishment of support crews, definition of crew bases for nationwide support, elaboration of troubleshooting procedures, etc.

        The experience in Telecommunications of UNION principal and associated ad-hoc senior partners is very wide, including, beyond satellite communications, terrestrial radio links, fiber optic links as well as wireless LAN and WAN systems dimensioning installation and maintenance.

        It is worthwhile to mention also the active participation of UNION principal in international forums

    like Brazilian administration representative to INTELSA T and participation on technical committees of the ITU-R (ITU Radiocommunications Sector).

    3. ACADEMIC AND RESEARCH ACTIVITIES

    UNION has tight links with universities, research centers and partners in the telecommunications sector, which assures that the Company keeps in line with the latest trends and technologies in the area.

    In particular, UNION has an on-going contract with CETUC, the Center of Studies in Telecommunications of the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio the Janeiro, PUC-RJ, where its principal engineer is involved with research activities on wireless and satellite communications.