Adien Granted one of the first Ofcom GPR Licences...

Adien were granted one of the first GPR licences by Ofcom in September. Adien’s parent company PipeHawk announced that Ofcom has issued the first licences to operate GPR equipment to PipeHawk plc and Adien Limited, heralding the official acceptance of GPR as a maturing technology.

Gordon Watt, Chairman of PipeHawk plc, said “This is a significant advance for PipeHawk as it means GPR is now an acknowledged and regulated technology, and all companies which purport to use GPR must now be registered and regulated to operate legally.”
Prior to this, the legislative status of GPR as a technology was ambiguous with the Euro GPR Association members operating under a waiver.

GPR is a UWB technology that radiates short duration pulses that appear in the frequency domain as a very low signal across wide spectral regions and does not fit into the normal radio-licensing regime.
The UK licensing arrangements were negotiated by Dr Richard Chignell, PipeHawk's Technical Director, a past Chairman and currently licensing officer of the Euro GPR Association.

Negotiations continue, for a consistent Europe wide licensing regime. The PipeHawk Board expects that the new UK scheme will have a seamless transition to the anticipated European scheme.