Kingsway has 10 SY580 PoC handheld terminals on site with a dispatcher software installed on a laptop in its office (shown below). The shopping centre is on the EE cellular network, running through an external APN and is running on firmware version 2.7.2. The system has been up and running since 1 March and a coverage survey was performed prior to installation.
No cellular infrastructure installed or needed, although a gap in cellular coverage is present in the building’s basement and when working there, the users’ devices use the centre’s Wi-Fi network. Phil Bayliss, Ninehundred Communications’ senior account manager, said that that the service adheres to both 3GPP and OMA-POC standards and that the servers providing the services are housed in a secure server centre with “direct links to the mobile networks”. The system also uses fixed IP address, which “helps with resiliency and the traffic on the network).
The ability for wider area communications was essential. Along with the dispatcher and services available through that at a hugely lower cost compared to a radio equivalent.
The shopping centre’s management team had looked at PoC years beforehand but at that the time the mobile network coverage was not strong enough and the devices were not ideal for the security team. It has become a much better proposition now that the correct devices and 4G networks are available.
Colin Rees, the centre’s operations manager said: “We have recently purchased these [PoC] radios and they work absolutely fine. The dispatcher is linked onto another laptop which our centre administrator Sue Brown-Robinson uses and again it works well. You can talk to the guy from the dispatcher via SOS… you can pinpoint exactly where the radios and people are if they’re communicating with a distress call. The reception that we get on the new radios now, rather than having a base station, [was recently illustrated when] I took my radio home one weekend 23 miles away and I could hear clear as day what the guys were doing…”
Further reading
How to buy PTT over Cellular
In the market for… PTT over Cellular platforms
PTT over Cellular: A brave new world
Industry giant launches MNO-agnostic PTT over cellular
