Motorola SA, a US-owned company, was a well-known fixture in the South African communications field in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1985 the company was sold to Allied Technologies (Altech), which was later renamed Alcom Systems and then became BEE company Alcom Matomo. More recently, during a rebranding exercise, all Altech owned companies received the prefix ‘Altech’, hence the new name – Altech Alcom Matomo.
The company has a staff of 41 based at the head office in Johannesburg and branches in Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth. “As evidence of our technical focus, over 50% of our employees are engineers, the majority of whom are based at our head office,” said sales director Noel Watermeyer.
Altech Alcom Matomo has highly experienced engineering, project management, systems integration, testing and field engineering departments that ensure the twin primary goals of total system integration and meeting the customer’s expectations and requirements are always achieved.
“We have a mixed bag of customers, including national, provincial and municipal government departments, the major utilities including Transnet and Eskom. Our private customers are spread across heavy industry and include the major refineries and mines, which deploy private communications networks. In addition to South African Government customers, we also provide products to the governmental departments of other southern African countries through our distributor network,” Watermeyer explained.
The company provides private radio communication networks to those agencies and companies who own their networks. “In this instance we would merely supply solutions and assist with their operation, leaving the actual running of the network to the customer or providing total network operation if needed. Here we are supplying, amongst others, the latest digital technology – the TETRA (TErrestrial Trunked RAdio) wide area digital communications network,” Watermeyer said.
The company has provided highly sophisticated networks, such as the one recently installed for the South African Police Service (SAPS) in Gauteng. “We linked 67 sites into the network, with 30 000 radios operated through this network. TETRA radios have built-in GPS, emergency call buttons and they allow the user to make phone calls and send text messaging,” Watermeyer said.
“On all of our systems, we can provide inter-site linking through microwave and multiplexers. Towers, antennas, containers, standby power systems, voice recording, vehicle tracking and even security fencing, making it a totally integrated communications solution,” Watermeyer said. “Additionally we have a broadband wireless network offering for those clients who are situated in areas not readily served by the main operators or those that have dedicated private requirements.”
The company offers scada systems providing network RTUs (remote terminal units) for remote data retrieval and control on the scada system. “We have provided a number of radio, microwave and fibre-optic based networks to a variety of customers, dependent on their needs and the working environment,” Watermeyer explained.
“We have customers using this service in the water, electricity supply and communication network markets. We have installed RTUs at substations for Eskom where the RTU gathers information and transmits it back to the supervisory control system. Several of our systems are installed at water supply facilities to check reservoir water levels and to monitor and control the water pumps, even TETRA network alarm monitoring requirements use these solutions,” Watermeyer adds.
In addition to the SAPS contract, the company has also supplied both the Botswana and Angola Police Services with TETRA. “Another noteworthy contract was for the supply of a 10 000 TETRA radio network to the City of Cape Town operating across 28 wide area sites. This was in fact our first digital network and is also the only local government-owned single solution currently servicing all their municipal users. We have had very positive feedback on this project, which after 10 years is still running extremely well,” Watermeyer said.
The company provides products from the extensive Motorola EMS (Enterprise and Mobility Solutions) range, which includes Dimetra IP, Astro, Vortex, Ace SCADA and WiBB (Wireless Broadband) solutions. A wide range of both digital and analogue Motorola mobile, base station, portable radios and accessories are also available.
For more information contact Noel Watermeyer, Altech Alcom Matomo, +27 (0)11 235 7652, nwatermeyer@alcom.co.za, www.alcommatomo.co.za
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