Names and Trademarks

As the world of Doppler current meters has increased in size, the number of descriptive names, models names and trademarks have proliferated.

Nortek uses the following general terms (generic names) and model names (trade names):

Generic Name Description Nortek Model Names
Current Profiler, ADCP Instrument based on the Acoustic Doppler principle that measures a profile of the current velocity using one or more acoustic beams. Each measurement level is referred to as a depth cell or a bin. Aquadopp Profiler, AWAC, Continental, VM-Profiler, HR-Profiler, and NDP
Current Meter Instrument that measures the velocity in one cell, typically used on time scales of 1 s or longer Aquadopp 
Velocimeter Instrument that uses focused acoustic beams to measure the velocity at high sampling rates (>1 Hz) in a small sampling volume. Vector, Vectrino, NDV

ADCP (Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler) was the first name used for current profilers. It was introduced by RD Instruments of San Diego, California and in the 80's, this name was both a trade name and a generic term, well established throughout the growing community of users.  Today, the term is found in scientific papers, in official contract documents, in engineering guidelines, and in the daily language.  As far as we can see, the term is used as a generic term for all current profilers, regardless of manufacturer and has lost its status as a trade name.

A variation of this situation applies to the term ADV, which is a registered trademark of Sontek/YSI of San Diego, California, USA. As with ADCP, users of both Sontek and Nortek velocimeters tend to use ADV as a generic name. Because of the worldwide protection offered by the US courts to US trademark holders, Nortek no longer refers to any of its products as ADVs, even if we realize that many of our customers continue to use the term ADV in scientific papers and in everyday conversations.

We honor the trademarks of other companies and distinguish our products with our own model names and abbreviations. If you are a reseller, system integrator, research scientist or engineer publishing information which discusses Nortek products we encourage you to use generic names rather than registered trademarks when referring to instrument categories and the full Nortek product name when you need to be specific. In writing, you should avoid constructions where you combine a reference to Nortek with other companies trademarks because it may violate US trademark law.

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