Chronos Technology

Chronos Technology is a British timing and synchronisation specialist founded in September 1986 by Professor Charles Curry and based at Stowfield House in Lydbrook, Gloucestershire, in the Forest of Dean. It is a small company with an outsized presence in one specific field: proving that GPS and other satellite signals are being interfered with, and doing something about it. Since Curry and his wife Angela transferred their holding, the business has been owned by the Chronos Technology Employee Ownership Trust, a succession arrangement chosen to keep the operation intact and the jobs in place rather than sell to a trade buyer.

The work divides into three strands. The first is timing and synchronisation infrastructure: master clocks, frequency and timing distribution, network sync design and audit, Precision Time Protocol deployment, and the MiFID II timing service that financial firms need to timestamp trades to regulatory tolerance. Telecom, broadcast, energy, enterprise IT and finance customers sit mostly here.

The second is GNSS reception and distribution. Chronos supplies and integrates GNSS reference receivers, including Septentrio hardware, and sells GPS repeater systems that carry satellite signals into hangars, indoor test facilities and underground spaces. RF-over-fibre distribution kit, including 1U and 3U rack chassis, optical splitters and monitoring cards, moves signals over long runs with better noise immunity than copper. SubWAVE extends GNSS coverage into tunnels, car parks and transit stations so that ordinary receivers still produce a position underground. Syntony GNSS simulators are supplied for test and development.

The third strand is the one that gives Chronos its reputation in defence and security. The CTL3510 is a handheld GPS jamming detector, and the CTL3520 adds direction finding developed with the University of Bath so an operator can walk down which vehicle or person is carrying the jammer. These are used by police, aviation authorities, critical infrastructure operators and defence users, and they were among the first practical field tools for the problem. Around the hardware sit GNSS cyber security audits, interference monitoring services and consultancy on how exposed a given site or network is to jamming and spoofing. Chronos has publicly reported spoofing incidents found by its own interference locator in the field.

The research record is a large part of why the company matters more than its size suggests. Chronos led GAARDIAN, which built a network of GPS interference detection and monitoring sensors deployed near infrastructure that depends on positioning, navigation and timing, monitoring integrity, reliability, continuity and accuracy around the clock and reporting to a central server. It then led SENTINEL, the UK government sponsored follow-on programme that scaled that work up and produced much of the public evidence base on how often GNSS jamming actually happens on British roads and near critical sites.

Chronos serves broadcast, defence and security, energy, enterprise IT, finance, manufacturing and test, and telecom customers, and maintains a presence in the Benelux and Scandinavian markets alongside its UK operation. It is part product vendor, part distributor and integrator, and part consultancy, and it does not fit neatly into any one of those categories.