In a small, simple box, Signal Hound has put big capabilities. The small company located in La Center, Washington, has been working for years on designing and manufacturing its line of compact, lightweight USB-powered signal analyzers that offer significant abilities to analyze and record radio frequency signals.
The company, started by CEO Bruce Devine, began as a test equipment repair shop called Test Equipment Plus. After years of repairing many different types of network test equipment, Devine said, the company’s first original design focused on a color LCD retrofit kit for a series of Hewlett-Packard signal analyzers.
After expanding its LCD retrofit kits, his engineer came to him with a proposal to design a signal analyzer. But Devine said the technology and cost weren’t quite there yet in the first round, and it took a second before he thought the design met all the necessary qualifications for a lightweight, compact and inexpensive signal analyzer that was significantly different from traditional equipment.
Dubbed the Signal Hound, the company’s first SA44 spectrum analyzer was first offered in 2010, and the product was so well received that Devine said it shifted the company’s focus from repair to manufacturing and even prompted a name change. As of April 2014, Test Equipment Plus began operating as Signal Hound. In May, Signal Hound won the Electronic Component News Impact Award for test and measurement products, competing against top test equipment companies and winning out.
Signal Hound has introduced a second series, its BB series. Compared to signal analyzers that cost tens of thousands of dollars, those from Signal Hound run from about $900 for the SA44B to less than $3,000 for the BB60C model.
Listen to an interview with Bruce Devine about the origins and evolution of the company, as well as its products’ capabilities:
