Wireless technology, such as cellphones, fitness trackers, and medical devices, has become ubiquitous. Before a wireless device is manufactured and sold, its technology is tested by compliance engineering laboratories to ensure it adheres to technical standards established by organizations including the IEEE Standards Association.
In the United States, the Federal Communications Commission oversees regulations for all wireless devices, while the Food and Drug Administration focuses on medical technology. The two organizations often work together.
RF Safety Laboratory
Founder:
Steve Liu
Founded:
2023
Headquarters:
Catonsville, Md.
Employees:
8
To help tech companies get their wireless devices certified, IEEE Member Steve Liu founded RF Safety Laboratory in 2023. The startup, based in Catonsville, Md., specializes in specific absorption rate (SAR) testing, nerve stimulation testing, and measuring power density levels of charging docks, surgical tools, tablets, and other products. SAR testing measures the amount of RF energy absorbed by the human body from a wireless device. Nerve stimulation and power density tests measure the instantaneous effects on a person’s nervous system.
Liu says many of the lab’s clients, who are based in Japan, South Korea, and the United States, want to sell their products in Canada and the United States, which have the strictest, most difficult regulations to navigate.
The lab specializes in ensuring wireless devices are certifiably safe, providing consumers with peace of mind.
“Not everyone knows SAR levels are publicly available on the FCC website,” Liu says.
Many product developers don’t realize that when integrating Wi-Fi or 5G into a device, they need to include shielding against radiation in their designs to protect humans from excess radiation, Liu says.
“Startups and new designers of wireless technology in these countries don’t realize they can’t just make a device and then expect to be able to export it to North America,” he says. “More often than not, these companies only find this out after they have already begun to market their products to consumers, causing them to be held by customs and border protection.”
If a product is found to be noncompliant with regulations, the company can face significant fines and legal actions, and the device can be recalled.
From testing engineer to startup founder
Liu is no stranger to technical standards and regulations. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in biomedical and electrical engineering in 2000 from Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, he joined PCTest Engineering Laboratory, in Columbia, Md. The company, now part of Element, was created to provide regulatory and testing services to the wireless, electronics, and telecommunications industries.
As a testing engineer, Liu assessed products’ electromagnetic compatibility, RF exposure levels, and hearing-aid compatibility. He also served as a member of the Telecommunication Certification Body, which assesses equipment. He worked his way up the career ladder and, in 2018, was promoted to vice president of engineering, overseeing global compliance.
“Being an IEEE member has definitely paid off for me.”
“I’ve certified more than 4,000 products for companies including Apple, Motorola, Samsung, Sony, and Rivian,” Liu says. “It was a really awesome experience to be engaged with such large companies and a vast portfolio of products, although we were a small-scale operation just doing regulatory electromagnetic compatibility and RF safety-type testing.”
In 2020 the company was acquired by Element, a London-based provider of critical-materials testing, product qualification testing, inspection, and certification services. New bosses meant a new culture and a different way of working.
“Although the new management was supportive and it was a good experience, I felt that I couldn’t spend the time and energy I wanted to on solving problems, helping customers, or mentoring my employees,” Liu says. After 23 years, he left in 2023 to start his own company, using some of his retirement savings. Six of his colleagues joined his venture.
The RF Safety Laboratory team in 2023 [from left]: Mark Biros (head of operations), Phuong Nguyen (technical manager), Kaitlin O’Keefe (head of engineering), Steve Liu (president), former employee, Burcu Derkunt (head of business development), and Bich Nguyen (director of engineering).
RF Safety Laboratory
How wireless tech gets assessed
To get certified, new wireless products are tested against established standards such as IEEE 802.11 to ensure they meet requirements for performance and security. When a company develops a device, it sends the technology to an authorized test lab, where technicians determine if the product is satisfactory.
If the device is certified, the company can move forward with manufacturing and distribution. If it doesn’t pass muster, the company can stop working on it or fix the problem and resubmit the device for certification.
When products fail testing, companies retain organizations such as RF Safety Lab to figure out what has to be done to be certified, Liu says.
Although the startup works with large companies including Belkin, Google, and Sony, he says, most of its clients are new designers and small businesses.
“A lot of large, tier-one companies already have the experience necessary to fix issues found during regulatory testing, so they don’t encounter serious roadblocks unless they’re developing a novel technology,” he says. “But we are seeing that a lot of new designers are not aware of the regulations, so they come to us for help.
“Many times they just need to be educated on the regulations and told what documents they need to supply to get their device certified,” he says, adding that “there are cases where we need to run our own tests and assessments to determine how the product can comply with regulations.”
After the lab evaluates the product, it compiles a report with its findings including recommendations on how to remedy any failures. Corrective measures can include changing power levels, redesigning an antenna, and updating software parameters to influence an antenna’s behavior.
Liu says that one of his most challenging projects was a wireless endoscope developed by a group of doctors from Illinois. An endoscope is a thin, flexible instrument with a camera on the end, used to look inside the human body. Although small, it is connected via a wire to a monitor, which the surgeon can view during the procedure. And operating rooms have numerous other machines with wires in addition to endoscopes.
The Illinois doctors wanted to decrease the number of wires in operating rooms, so they developed a wireless endoscope that uses a high-frequency 60-gigahertz RF transmitter, which displays high-resolution images on a monitor.
“They built this interesting device but didn’t know how to get it certified and the impact that testing could have on the final design,” Liu says.
“Like many companies, the designers were resourceful and purchased the transmitter parts at a low cost from a manufacturer overseas,” he says. “For a regulatory certification, you have to be able to configure devices for certain testing purposes, so the team and I had to do a deep dive to find instructions on how the transmitter worked and how it was made.” He says it was particularly challenging because the transmitter wasn’t the only off-the-shelf part the designers used.
Getting the device ready for certification required a lot of collaboration among the designers, the many part manufacturers, and regulatory agencies.
The process took several months to complete due to the product’s high frequency, which required preapproval guidance with the FCC.
“It was a very fun experience and a rewarding project for the team,” Liu says. “We had a good time seeing that project through.”
RF Safety Lab is expanding its reach and helping companies get their devices compliance-ready to be sold in the European Union. It also is working on getting products to meet global cybersecurity regulations.
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