connected van Berkel to the world of satellite communications, or satcom in today's language, at a time when developers and engineers were tackling something new: in-flight internet connectivity. His belief in the future of connected aircraft led him away from EMS Technologies and into starting his own company to chase his vision of this then-fledgling field. At a time when modems dominated telephone-based internet connectivity, van Berkel envisioned something more advanced. But his first focus of his new company was on improving the quality of the handsets used on aircraft flight phones. Then he moved into ever more-ambitious areas of the connected aircraft. Today's TrueNorth Avionics still manufactures advanced-design handsets - for both wired and wireless flight-phone systems. But increasingly, the company works to expand the connectivity of modern businessturbine aircraft. TrueNorth's success in this field served solely as a beginning of a decade of innovation, invention and growth leading up to the introduction of the company's top-line product, its Optelity Cabin Gateway, TrueNorth's next-generation cabin communications Optelity Hot Spot As a communications platform, TrueNorth's Optelity family is designed to seamlessly link with passenger devices - today's and tomorrow's - and the company's Stylus handsets. Continued on following page avionics news * may 2016 47