Lothar and Hermann playing radios

Rohde and Schwarz was founded in 1933 by Lothar Rohde and Hermann Schwarz  who met while studying physics in Jena. The first venture: developing a process and providing a commercial solution for measuring properties of RF insulators. Today, R&S is a market leader in wireless communications, RF test and measurement, broadcast and media, air traffic control and military radiocommunications, cybersecurity, and network technology.

This year, R&S received a comprehensive contract worth several billion to update the communications systems and equip almost all military units in the German Bundeswehr with its SOVERON digital radio system. To say that R&S is serious about radios would be a serious understatement!

The company employs 13,000 people with headquarters in Munich. About 80 of them are amateur radio operators who are members of the Rohde and Schwarz radio club DL0RUS.

And here is a photo of their shack: the main radio in use is a mighty ICOM IC-7610! Not a Flex or Elecraft, but a Japanese transceiver.

Yes, IC-7610. If it’s good for engineers of Rohde and Schwarz, it’s surely good enough for you and me.