RSSRepresentatives from Nokia and Ericsson were elected to lead the new critical communications Broadband Industry Group (BIG), a TCCA working group formed to encourage broadband vendor cooperation in developing common global critical communications solutions.
Related Stories
L3Harris Awarded $93 Million MBTA Contract
Verizon Frontline Response Team Deployed Nearly 700 Times in 2022
Philippe Agard, Nokia’s global public safety and defense segment leader, will chair BIG, supported by Jason Johur, Ericsson’s market development director, mission-critical communications, as vice-chair. They were elected at the BIG inaugural meeting, hosted 1 September by Finland’s State Security Networks, the national public-safety operator.
BIG will drive market adoption of standardized critical communications Long Term Evolution (LTE) and subsequent 5G technologies for the benefit of critical communications users and organizations, and promote an evolutionary approach toward future solutions. This work will build on the achievements of TCCA, which includes driving and supporting open standards and interoperability, and ongoing research into professional users’ requirements to protect customer investments for the long term.
“With the formation of BIG, TCCA has provided industry a home to advance critical service based on broadband, including migration to Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) LTE and 5G standard technologies,” said Tony Gray, TCCA CEO. “We are delighted to see the level of interest expressed by industry to participate to the work of this new group. With representatives from such established and respected companies in the lead, we can expect the BIG to develop and promote various benefits that broadband solutions can offer to critical communications customers, while at all times keeping the market for critical broadband solutions agile, open, innovative and competitive.
“In parallel, we will continue to recognize the importance of narrowband professional mobile radio (PMR) and model our broadband activities on the success of those technologies in supporting professional users worldwide. This success will be further strengthened by the evolution of interworking between critical narrowband and broadband technologies.”
The BIG will work closely with TCCA’s Critical Communications Broadband Group (CCBG). “This new initiative will help the coordination of critical communications standardization efforts in 3GPP together with the public-safety agencies and operators, in line with the CCBG goals and TCCA’s market representation partner role in 3GPP,” said CCBG Chairman Tero Pesonen.
Would you like to comment on this story? Find our comments system below.
