Thank you for the input, JimB and Ian Rogers. Here is an example of a text containing that expression:
**broken link removed**
"Intelligent Production System for Ultra Deepwater with Short Hop Wireless Power and Wireless Data Transfer for Lateral Production Control and Optimization"
I know that often the word "hop" is used where some kind of re-translation takes place, like "multi-hop network". I doubt that in this case the word relates to channel-hopping, because I have trouble imagining what "short-hop" would then mean. It's most probably related to distance, as in what JimB suggests, I'd just like to know if it's the same as short-range for these purposes.