Category Archives: Ham Radio

The amateur radio community has been buzzing about Motorola’s purchase of Yaesu. Actually, the deal is structured as a joint venture with Mot owning 80% of Vertex Standard (Yaesu is the marketing name for Vertex ham products.) The speculation is running wild on eham.net and other forums about what this means. As usual, these opinions are mostly bull hockey speculation… worth about what you paid for it.

This caused me to dig into the numbers behind this deal. How big is Vertex and how much of that is amateur radio? The total purchase price for 80% of the shares will be approximately ¥12.3 billion (or about US $108 million). From a PRNewswire report, Vertex sales for the fiscal year ending March 2007 were approximately ¥21.98 billion or $192.8 million. On the Vertex web site, I found a breakout of their revenues by product type: 27% ham radio, 70% land mobile and 3% data terminal. This means their ham radio sales are about $52M annually. A look at Kenwood’s 2007 Annual Report reveals that their Communications Equipment Business is about 36% of their total business, or $514M. The Communications Equipment Business includes Land Mobile Radio, Amateur Radio and some consumer wireless devices. I did not find the amateur radio number broken out separately. It is interesting that Kenwood’s annual report emphasizes their Land Mobile business and claims they are #2 in market share in that business. (I assume Mot is #1.) ICOM’s 2007 Annual Report shows their annual sales at $263.5M, almost all in the category of “Radio”. Just like Kenwood and Vertex, ICOM sells radio equipment to both the land mobile and the amateur radio markets. I can’t conclude from the data the specific amateur radio market share for these companies. However, if we look at the combined amateur+land mobile markets, these companies look like this:

• Vertex: $192.8M
• Kenwood: $514M
• ICOM: $263.5M

This is probably not a true “apples to apples” comparison, but it gives a rough feel for the relative size of these businesses. If we assume that Vertex is representative of these companies, then we see that the land mobile business is over twice the size of the amateur business. Not a surprise.

What does this mean for Motorola and Vertex? Hard to say, really. The main conclusion for me is that the land mobile market is the dominate business, with amateur radio playing the role of “little sister.” The amateur radio portion of Vertex probably lives or dies based on its profitability and how well it can leverage the land mobile R&D investment.

73, Bob K0NR

From the Big News From Newington Department:

Scot K9JY took it upon himself to write up a ham radio contesting tip every day in September. He ended up with a great list of 30 tips for improving your contesting experience. Scot writes from an HF contester’s point of view but most of the tips work well for VHF contests, too.

We need to get the religion out of ham radio. No, I am not talking about the HF nets that support missionaries or similar activities. (Those people might actually be doing something good for the world.) I am talking about the religious debates concerning new technology…this technology is better than that technology.

Amateur radio is a technical hobby, one based on technology, hobbyist pursuits and mutual interest. One might think that this means issues are looked at objectively and discussions are based on logic, scientific principles and facts. Of course, this is completely wrong. What often shows up in ham radio are religious debates about technology or operating modes.

Here’s a definition of Religion:

a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.

You can tell when you are stuck in a religious debate…the facts quickly fade and statements like “this is the right way to do it” become louder. Underneath this is a fundamental belief trying to come out that the person may not even be aware they have.

A long running example of a religious debate is Linux versus Windows. On the surface, people argue about which one has more defects, which one is more secure and which one ultimately serves their needs better. Underneath the surface is the religious belief: software should be free, Microsoft is evil, etc. Then there are those Mac enthusiasts (you know who you are)….these folks tend to act like a cult as they attempt to convert other people to their group. (Where is the line between enthusiast and cult member?)

The latest one on the ham radio front is the debate over digital technology in the VHF and higher bands: D-STAR versus APCO P25. The debate starts out rational with a discussion of the merits of each but soon the deeply-held beliefs come out: D-STAR is bad because ICOM is pushing it, P25 is good because it is the commercial standard, D-STAR is good because it is an amateur radio standard, D-STAR uses a proprietary vocoder chip so it is bad, etc. (For specific examples, click here, here and here.) Then don’t forget the guys that say “all digital is bad, analog FM is good.”

Again, you can tell when the religion kicks in because the facts start to fade and the beliefs rise to the surface. Usually, these arguments can’t be resolved because you can’t really debate beliefs. What you get instead are flame wars on the various email groups.

What other religious debates are out there? Code versus No-Code, Open Source Software versus Commercial Software, My favorite rig versus Your favorite rig, … what else?

-73, Bob K0NR

P.S. Was Betamax really better than VHS? 🙂

There is an important election coming up….no, not that silly race for the White House…I am talking about something really significant — the race for the ARRL Rocky Mountain Division Director. This person will be our representative to the ARRL Board of Directors. Talk about a tough job! You try representing the interests of the amateur radio population in the Rocky Mountain Division….see how easy that is!

Sometimes we lose sight of the fact that the ARRL is a member organization. Yes, there are those folks at HQ in Newington that seem to have their own agenda but it is the Board of Directors that run the ARRL.

From ARRL.org:

Current Rocky Mountain Vice Director Division Brian Mileshosky, N5ZGT, of Albuquerque, New Mexico, is running for Director against Jeff Ryan, K0RM, of Westminster, Colorado. Current Director Warren G. “Rev” Morton, WS7W, of Casper, Wyoming, is not seeking re-election. Vice Director candidates for the Rocky Mountain Division are Dwayne Allen, WY7FD, of Devil’s Tower, Wyoming, and Chris Howard, W0EP, of Fort Collins, Colorado.

Ballots will be sent to all full members of the League in that Division who are of good standing as of September 10, 2007 (you must be a licensed radio amateur to be a full member). The ballots will be mailed not later than October 1, 2007 and, to be valid, must be received at ARRL HQ by noon Eastern Time on Friday, November 16, 2007.

I am supporting Jeff Ryan K0RM for the Director position. I have had the pleasure of working with Jeff on a variety of ham radio activities over the last decade or so: ARES, Hamcon Colorado, Colorado Council of Amateur Radio Clubs (CCARC), Pikes Peak FM Association and other activities in the Colorado Section. Jeff makes a positive impact in every role he takes on. Jeff has consistently served the amateur radio community, using his strong leadership skills, excellent judgment and hard work.

Jeff is currently the ARRL Colorado Section Manager and does an excellent job of leading the section. The thing that impresses me most about Jeff is his ability to listen to all points of view while still letting people know where he stands on an issue. This is a tough balance that is critical in an elected position such as a Division Director.

To learn more about Jeff K0RM, see his web site at http://www.k0rm.net/

73, Bob K0NR

Ever wonder how much amateur radio equipment gets purchased each year? I was looking at some information on the new Kenwood TM-D710, including a press release on the Kenwood (Japan) web site.

The Kenwood press release includes some background on the ham radio market:

The global amateur radio equipment market is estimated to be worth 16 to 17 billion yen today. In the FM mobile transceiver segment, the dual band type, which was once considered a luxury model, has been gaining market share every year, accounted for about just over 50% of the amateur radio equipment market in sales value on a global basis and for almost 100% in both sales volume and sales value in Japan in the fiscal year ended March 2007.

Let me try to interpret this data. Since the Japanese yen is trading at around 115 yen to the US dollar, 16 Billion yen is equivalent to $139M. So this means that $139M in new ham equipment is purchased each year. The next statement is really interesting…I think it says that 50% of the dollars being spent on FM mobile transceivers are used to purchase dualband radios. And the final statement says that in Japan almost all of the FM transceivers sold are dualband. Clearly, the price of a dualband FM transceiver has come down over the last decade, especially those that have a single receiver in them. So it is believeable that dualband rigs cover a large piece of the FM transceiver market.

73, Bob K0NR

The 2007 Colorado 14er Event was held on August 12, 2007. During this event, amateur radio operators make radio contact from the summits of the state’s 14,000 foot mountains. Chris K0CAO made a short video of his hike up Mount Harvard and some of his radio action on the summit. The video also shows Chris using a signal mirror to flash operators on nearby mountaintops. Mount Harvard is the 3rd highest peak in Colorado, at 14,420 feet above sea level.

See the video at http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6446083004152361265

See my previous post on the 14er event.

I tend to let my incoming QSL cards pile up for a while and then fill them out in a batch. I don’t actually get all that many QSLs unless I am doing something special like a mini-DXpedition or activating a rare VHF grid.

Last week, I decided it was time to catch up on my QSL responses, so I fetched the small pile of cards and starting working on them. The first one came with an Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope (SASE) and I was able to find it in the log right away. A minute later, my QSL was filled out and ready to mail. Now that is the way it is supposed to work!

The next card in the pile was just a bare QSL card sent as a postcard, with no SASE included. This always makes me a little grumpy. My general policy is to respond to cards sent via the QSL bureau and cards sent direct that include an SASE. Everything else gets ignored. I’ve had to take a hard line on this when doing DXpeditions, otherwise the work just gets way out of hand. Everyone else needs your card but you probably don’t need any of theirs.

So I looked at the second card and thought “sorry, guy, but if you need my card you need to include an SASE” and I set it aside. I picked up the next card and it came inside an envelope but without an SASE. But this one was a grid on 6M that I needed, so I am looking at it a bit more graciously. Should I send my card back to this guy? Wouldn’t I just be encouraging bad QSL habits on his part? Judging by the information included on the card, this ham has probably been licensed for at least 10 years…he should know better. OK, maybe I’ll make an exception on this one since I really need his grid.

Here’s another card with no SASE. This time it is obviously a new callsign, so I am tempted to have pity on him. Didn’t anyone teach him to QSL properly? Perhaps I should ignore the lack of SASE and just send him a card. Is it my job to teach every ham QSL courtesy? Or maybe I need to lighten up?

Mostly, this just makes me grumpy. I am probably thinking about it too hard.

I recently came across a web page maintained by Ryota “Roy” Motobayashi, JJ1WTL / AC6IM that explains the Japanese amateur radio callsign system. I used to hold a Japan amateur radio license (reciprocal, based on my US license) with callsign 7J1AUE. I was traveling to Japan on business at the time, so I wanted to do some radio operating while I was there. I have since let the license lapse as it is expensive and a hassle to renew each year.

This web page had an interesting chart of Japanese amateur radio station licenses by year, showing a steep decline starting in 1995. (Click on the graphic to the left to make it larger.) Historically, Japan had more amateur radio licensees than the US but this appears to have changed. According to this chart, the number of station licenses in Japan has dropped to less that 534k last year while the number of US licensees is around 655k (according to the AH0A web site).

This is a bit of an apples-to-sushi comparison since the Japan system includes a station license and an operator license. However, the simplest reasonable comparision is to compare Japan station licenses to US operator licenses. Japan station licenses have a 5 year renewal term while the US licensees are valid for ten years. This increases the difficulty of a comparison as it affects the statistics in an environment where radio licenses are not being renewed. Actually, there are other issues identified by AH0A that need to be considered when making these comparisons.

Of course, most of the major amateur radio equipment manufacturers are located in Japan, so the Japanese ham market has an effect worldwide. Some examples: There has never been much 222 MHz radio equipment available, because there is no 222 MHz band in Japan. Ever notice that the CTCSS tone defaults to 88.5 Hz on Japanese radios? That’s the de facto standard for CTCSS in Japan. The “call” button on most Japanese FM rigs comes from the fact that in Japan there really is a calling frequency that you call on and announce that you’ll be listening on another frequency. (So you want to be able to QSY quickly on/off the call frequency.)

Anyway, the decline in Japan ham licenses is probably a leading indicator for the rest of the world, including the US. It also seems in line with general indications that the R&D investment into ham radio gear is slowing, with fewer rigs with fewer innovations being introduced each year. In the business world, they call that “a mature market.”

73, Bob K0NR

It is coming to your favorite frequency band this weekend…The Colorado QSO Party. This ham radio contest….er, party….is sponsored by the Pikes Peak Radio Amateur Assocation. These guys have gotten sponsors for over 50 plaques to be given out, which is an amazing accomplishment. If you don’t win a plaque, there are plenty of certificates, too.

There has also been a major push to get all of the Colorado counties activated. If you are interested in operating mobile, this will be a great opportunity to go activate a rare county. Frequency coverage includes all HF, VHF and UHF bands except 60 meters and WARC bands.

Turn on the radio, get on the air and work someone this weekend.

73, Bob K0NR