(commonly known as Furuno) is a Japanese electronics company whose main products are
marine electronics Marine electronics refers to electronics devices designed and classed for use in the marine environment on board ships and yachts where even a small amount of salt water can destroy some electronics devices. Therefore, the majority of these types of ...
, including
marine radar systems,
fish finders, and navigational instruments. The company also manufactures
global positioning systems
The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of the global navigation satellite sy ...
and
medical equipment, and entered the
weather radar
Weather radar, also called weather surveillance radar (WSR) and Doppler weather radar, is a type of radar used to locate precipitation, calculate its motion, and estimate its type (rain, snow, hail etc.). Modern weather radars are mostly pulse- ...
market in 2013.
History
Furuno Electric Shokai was founded in Nagasaki, Japan in 1948. The same year, Furuno commercialized the world's first practical
fish finder. Manufacturing continued to ramp up as the decade came to a close, and by the mid-1950s, Furuno was producing various Marine supplements, such as early examples of commercial
Marine radars. In 1973, Furuno created an early iteration of satellite positioning receivers for vessels at sea. Later that decade, Furuno entered the United States market, establishing an HQ in the United States as Furuno USA. Following this expansion and continued growth, Furuno continued expanding their marine-based radar products. In 2009, Furuno acquired
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
based eRide, Inc., a
fabless semiconductor company
Fabless manufacturing is the design and sale of hardware devices and semiconductor chips while outsourcing their fabrication (or ''fab'') to a specialized manufacturer called a semiconductor foundry. These foundries are typically, but not exclu ...
. Following this acquisition, in 2013, Furuno introduced an X-band
weather radar
Weather radar, also called weather surveillance radar (WSR) and Doppler weather radar, is a type of radar used to locate precipitation, calculate its motion, and estimate its type (rain, snow, hail etc.). Modern weather radars are mostly pulse- ...
, the smallest of its kind. In 2015, the company's
GNSS Receiver Modules were used in
radio controlled
Radio control (often abbreviated to RC) is the use of control signals transmitted by radio to remotely control a device. Examples of simple radio control systems are garage door openers and keyless entry systems for vehicles, in which a sma ...
flying
quadcopter
A quadcopter or quadrotor is a type of helicopter with four rotors.
Although quadrotor helicopters and convertiplanes have long been flown experimentally, the configuration remained a curiosity until the arrival of the modern UAV or drone. T ...
s.
In popular culture
Furuno's marine electronic devices has been featured in ''
Licence to Kill
''Licence to Kill'' is a 1989 spy film, the sixteenth in the ''James Bond'' series produced by Eon Productions, and the second and final film to star Timothy Dalton as the MI6 agent James Bond. It sees Bond suspended from MI6 as he pursues t ...
'' (1989) as product placement.
[Scheidemann, Robert]
"Furuno Marine Electronics in Licence To Kill (1989)"
Gallery
Notes
External links
Furuno Global pageFuruno Global pageFuruno Galicia(in Spanish)
* Wiki collection of bibliographic works on Furuno
{{Authority control
Electronics companies of Japan
Defense companies of Japan
Global Positioning System
Fishing equipment manufacturers
Avionics companies
Marine electronics
Navigation system companies
Radar manufacturers
Health care companies of Japan
Companies listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange
Companies based in Hyōgo Prefecture
Electronics companies established in 1938
1938 establishments in Japan
Japanese brands