ETELM begins work on final phase of European Union-commissioned
BroadWay pilot
Frequentis-led consortium down to the final two in developing interoperable Public Protection & Disaster Relief (PPDR) mobile broadband system
October 2021: ETELM, the radio communications infrastructure specialist, has entered the third and final phase of its work with the BroadPort consortium to develop a pan-European interoperable mobile broadband system for Public Protection & Disaster Relief (PPDR) users.
Having successfully completed the Prototype Phase, ETELM is part of the Frequentis-led consortium that is among just two consortia left in this European Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) Project, BroadWay. They have now been invited to move onto the next phase, which will be to develop the prototype solution into a live, useable pilot system.
The BroadWay initiative was created by the public safety agencies from 11 European countries and is operating under the framework of Horizon 2020, a flagship EU research and innovation programme. Collectively, these agencies provide mobile communication services to around 1.4 million responders and deal with an array of crimes and disasters throughout the continent.
Where currently each country possesses its own separate system to handle mission-critical communications, the objective of BroadWay is to develop a unified solution that will allow European first responders to communicate, share and access information regardless of the country in which they intervene. This will provide operational mobility for public safety responders across Europe by linking national mission-critical mobile broadband networks to act as one.
Now at its pilot stage, the consortium is required to develop a solution that reaches Technology Readiness Level 8, a system originally developed by NASA to provide uniformity of technical maturity across different technologies. Level 8 will require a complete and fully operational system that achieves the best possible performance across each of the project’s 11 objectives.
A primary goal will be to ensure that the pilot system succeeds in being interconnected and provided as-a-service to offer the widest operational mobility. In particular, it must provide secure operational and EU interoperable communication for law enforcement agencies and other PPDR practitioners so that they are able to protect and respond in cross-border cooperation. Operational mobility of this standard will allow practitioners to operate wherever they are, whenever they need to, and with whomever they are tasked to cooperate.
Nicolas Hauswald, CEO at ETELM, said: “The impact of this innovation-led project will be felt by all police, firefighters and other emergency units when dealing with any cross-border incident or disaster as it unfolds. It will also become an essential tool in managing public safety, enabling enhanced security and more effective emergency responses.
“ETELM has been developing professional radio communications infrastructure for over 40 years, working with critical communications organisations around the globe, and we are very proud to bring our expertise to this important project.
“The demands of critical communications require not only robust and reliable solutions that can operate in any situation, no matter the environment, but also the capacity to transmit increasingly rich data without delay. Add to this the need to seamlessly integrate across numerous different jurisdictions and our challenge here is to demonstrate a single, future-proofed system that will enable emergency services, first responders and critical national infrastructure operators across Europe to complete their essential duties not only unhindered but also significantly enhanced by the technology that we are developing. It’s an exciting prospect, and we are fully committed to its success.”
The BroadWay Pilot Phase (Phase 3) begins in October 2021 and will last until September 2022.
The full BroadPort consortium, led by Frequentis, consists of the following partners: ETELM, Crosscall, Halys, Municipality of Málaga, Nemergent Solutions SL, and Universidad de Málaga. The subcontractors are: Arico Technologies, Control Center Apps GmbH, Comfone, Eutelsat SA, Lyfo, PrioCom B.V., Telefónica I+D, T-Mobile Netherlands B.V., and Virtual Fort Knox AG.
Critical communications Networks for emergency services, first responders and the military
Critical communications Networks for emergency services, first responders and the military
The team at Etelm recently attended Milipol Paris 2019, the leading event for homeland security and safety, featuring over 1000 exhibitors from 53 countries. Delegates visiting our stand were introduced to a full end to end private LTE display, to demonstrate the technology’s application in this sector.
Ultimately, communications don’t get much more critical than those for emergency services and the military. Police, fire, ambulance, search and rescue and the armed forces – all need to be able to communicate efficiently and reliably with colleagues both in centralised premises and on the move throughout emergency operations. Failure to achieve this really can be a matter of life or death.
But what do critical communications networks for these crucial services look like in practice? What challenges do they need to respond to, and how is evolving technology changing them? In this article we take a closer look.
Critical requirements for critical services
First responders, security and armed forces need to make highly-informed, quick decisions on the ground. Increasingly, there is a demand for those decisions to be driven by data. Examples include receiving medical information whilst responding to an accident, or dictating the movement of a fleet of vehicles based on the locations of others. In turn, this means that the communications networks supporting such services are moving towards a need for combined voice and often high bandwidth data.
In addition to this, critical communications networks in these sectors often need to operate across rugged and remote terrain, and many services cross international borders too. Currently, the use of traditional PMR technologies such as TETRA (Terrestrial Trunked Radio) are favoured for maximum security and reliability. However, these networks do not offer the bandwidth needed to support smart applications with their increased data requirements, or rich communication formats such as video. Interoperability is often restricted too.
Evolving to next generation emergency service networks
This is where LTE comes in. LTE networks offer greater bandwidth and flexibility when it comes to data-rich applications and video, enabling emergency services, first responders and military organisations to integrate data seamlessly with their voice communications. Examples of data requirements include geolocation, status reports, connected soldier data (biodata), connected and unmanned vehicle data and video. They provide a foundation for unified communications, both in terms of the information carried across communications networks, and interoperability between different networks.
Etelm was recently named as part of a consortium selected to deliver a pan-European interoperable broadband mobile architecture for Public Protection and Disaster Relief (PPDR). The initiative, called BroadWay, has been created by the public safety agencies from 11 European countries and is operating under the framework of the European Horizon 2020 programme. It will enable first responders across Europe to smoothly communicate, share and access information regardless of the country in which they intervene.
Earlier this year, Etelm was also named as part of a consortium of French SMEs selected for the PRODEF challenge, which was launched in early 2019 by the Defense Innovation Agency (AID). The challenge aims to develop a solution to aid France’s military in the identification of threats to airbases and its response to these.
The proposed solution is based on a secure private broadband multimedia radio network, based on standard LTE technology that would cover a permanent or temporary airbase or an unexpected incident or crisis site and be integrated with a set of autonomous sensors that can be deployed quickly.
These examples indicate the growing requirement for high bandwidth, private mission critical networks and illustrate the potential LTE and next generation communication technologies have to play in the military and public safety sectors.
For more information on how ETELM can support critical communications requirements for the military and public safety sectors get in touch.
