In early 2019, the French Defense Innovation Agency (AID) launched the PRODEF challenge with the support of the Directorate General of Armaments (DGA), the French government defense procurement and technology agency. The challenge was launched in order to enable French subject matter experts (SMEs) to propose innovative technology solutions to the challenges faced by the Ministry of the Armed forces in their mission to protect and defend air bases.

In a letter to new U.S. Virgin Islands Governor Albert Bryan Jr., FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly asked the governor to help end the territory’s practice of diverting 9-1-1 fees to other purposes, suggesting that additional universal service fund (USF) dollars to support the territory’s damaged communications infrastructure may not be available while the fee diversion continues.

Everbridge announced that the Florida Division of Emergency Management (FDEM) has signed a five-year extension of its statewide mass notification platform, AlertFlorida, to bolster Florida’s ongoing hurricane preparedness efforts.

The Utilities Broadband Alliance (UBBA), formed earlier this year and spearheaded by founding member Anterix, formerly pdvWireless, is addressing the business case for private Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks for utilities, along with use cases and technology considerations.

The U.K. Emergency Services Network (ESN) announced it demonstrated the new Interworking functionality between the ESN and Airwave networks with Motorola Solutions.

Hytera Mobilfunk won an invitation to tender from the National Police in Peru to optimize the safety-critical communications of the emergency services.

Several common themes stood out in reply comments filed in the FCC’s 900 MHz realignment proceeding, which proposes a 3-by-3-megahertz broadband segment to allow for Long Term Evolution (LTE) services in the band.

The relentless drive for more Wi-Fi and cellphone spectrum is on a collision course with established public-safety communications networks. Technology consumers expect more wireless services that are faster, ubiquitously available and uncongested. The demand is so high that the FCC opened a proceeding to adopt rules for unlicensed use in the 6 GHz spectrum, which is currently licensed to many public-safety entities and businesses that rely on the spectrum for safety and critical communications for fixed point-to-point microwave communications.

Last month, the IJIS Institute, the Department of Homeland Security Science & Technology Directorate (DHS S&T) and Google hosted a Text-to-911 Translation TechFest at the Google campus in Kirkland, Washington.

A group of companies made a presentation to the FCC outlining an engineering study that showed that 6 GHz radio local area network (RLAN) operations will protect fixed service (FS) links from interference.