Brief History and Legal Status of ASC

ASC, Antenna Systems Consulting ApS was founded in 1989 by Peter Balling to provide independent engineering support in antenna systems with special expertise and design software for satellite contoured- and multibeam antenna systems. The company is registered in Taastrup, Denmark. The director and owner of the company is Peter Balling.

Experience of ASC

Photo of Peter Balling Peter Balling is a specialist in satellite antennas. In this capacity, he has since the establishment of ASC supported several European and international satellite operators including EUTELSAT, INMARSAT, INTELSAT, New Skies and SES ASTRA in the specification, evaluation and development of antenna systems for their satellite programmes.

The company has a unique expertise in satellite antennas (in particular design, analysis and testing of multibeam, contoured-beam and reconfigurable antennas), reflector and arrays antennas, feed systems, beamforming networks (passive or active, analogue or digital).

Studies and software developments have been carried out for ESA/ESTEC as well as European, American and Japanese satellite operators and manufacturers. Over the years, the company has participated in European Community COST antenna R&D programmes - most recently in COST 284 (Innovative Antennas for Emerging Terrestrial & Space-Based Applications) 2002-2006, COST IC0603 (Antenna Systems & Sensors for Information Society Technologies - ASSIST) 2007-2011 and the FP6 Network of Excellence ACE (Antenna Centre of Excellence) 2004-2007.

Facilities of ASC

A comprehensive proprietary FORTRAN-based antenna analysis and design software library is available in support of the work by ASC. The software library applies to both reflector and array antennas and is being updated continuously as needed. The software is mainly being used for design studies as part of the development of either antenna specifications or antenna concepts and for independent antenna performance verifications, e.g., as part of proposal evaluations to determine the soundness of proposed antenna designs and their claimed performance.

The extensive graphics software also available uses the portable INTERACTER graphics library and Tcl/Tk that allow the same software to be operated on the different platforms without change.

Brief C.V. for Peter Balling

Peter Balling was born in Maribo, Denmark in 1944. He received the MScEE and the PhD degrees in communications and microwave engineering from the Technical University of Denmark, in 1969 and 1972, respectively.

Professional career

1989-present  Independent consultant in antenna systems and director of ASC, Antenna Systems Consulting ApS, registered in Taastrup, Denmark.
1984-1989 With TICRA, a consulting company in Copenhagen, Denmark, to develop computer-aided design methods for antenna systems for future communications, remote sensing and data relaying satellites.
1981-1984 Member of technical staff in the Antenna and Propagation Section of the R&D department at INTELSAT, Washington, D.C., working with reconfigurable multi-beam antennas for satellite communications systems. Support to and monitoring of R&D projects and on-going satellite development programmes.
1974-1981 With TICRA developing antenna design and analysis software, and satellite antenna prototypes. Early work on contoured-beam shaped reflector antennas.
1972-1974 With the Department of Electrical Engineering at University of Zambia, Lusaka, Zambia, as a Peace Corps Volunteer and an honorary lecturer to teach courses in telecommunications.
1969-1972 With Electromagnetics Institute, the Technical University of Denmark, as a research assistant and PhD student.

Professional membership

Peter Balling is a member of the Management Committee of COST IC0603 and participated in ACE. He has contributed to seven antenna COST actions since COST 204 and served as secretary to several. He is a member of the IEEE (AP, COM, MTT), the Danish Society of Engineers (IDA), the Danish Astronomical Society and the AGU.

  Locations of visitors to this page