Mission Critical Technologies Africa 2018 in Cape Town, 13-15 November 2018

I am excited to be exhibiting and speaking at this year’s Mission Critical Technologies Africa.

We will be showing how we can use our technology to solve communications challenges faced by police, fire and rescue, ambulance and other public safety agencies throughout Africa.

What are those challenges?

• Challenge 1 - Harnessing the complementary benefits of digital radio and mobile broadband technologies.  Many public safety service providers are planning for an extended period of co-existence for digital radio systems and mobile broadband networks.  This is understandable given that LTE mobile broadband networks promise access to cutting-edge, transformative applications that will enhance frontline personnel safety, improve situational awareness and boost productivity. TETRA land mobile radio systems, however, remain the best choice for supporting mission-critical voice services. How are you planning to maximise the benefits of TETRA coexistence with LTE?
• Challenge 2 - Managing diverse data from an increasing number of sources. With the increasing adoption of wearables, and the growing number of information sources, we are fast approaching a tipping point. This is where the risk of not knowing what we know increases. How do you isolate that critical piece of information that could have changed the outcome of an incident?
• Challenge 3 - Managing risk and keeping up with the pace of technology change. With the fast pace of technology advancement, do you have the skills and expertise required to maximise system performance and mitigate risk readily available in-house?
• Challenge 4 - Ensuring staff can communicate and collaborate in real-time. Creating reliable communications systems presents multiple challenges. How do you design networks to ensure that the technology used matches user requirements?

Visit us on stand A84 and learn from our experts about our range of solutions that can help you address these challenges:

The new ST7500 compact TETRA radio, Ultra Portable LTE Infrastructure, our LEX L11 Mission-Critical LTE Device, Si500 Body Worn Camera, Avigilon Appearance Search™ and Unusual Motion Detection, Control Room Systems coupled with our Command Centre Software,  Managed and Support Services to maximise your system’s availability and equipment uptime, high performance networks - MOTOTRBO™ Capacity Max and DIMETRA Express, WAVE broadband push-to-talk and a range of purpose-built TETRA, MOTOTRBO, ASTRO 25, and LTE devices. Wow!

Read our dedicated event guide to find out more.

I am also excited to be speaking in the conference on a very topical subject:

'National mission critical networks – leveraging digital technologies alongside broadband' in 'Connecting Africa' on Thursday 15 November 2018 from 12:50 to 13:10.

Visitor passes for Mission Critical Technologies Africa are free. You can register here.

Mission Critical Technologies Africa is also co-located with AfricaCom so you could easily combine visits to both. Visitor passes for both events are free.

You can also keep up-to-date with news and events on our Safer Cities, Secure Businesses Africa microsite at www.motorolasolutions.com/saferafrica

I look forward to seeing you in Cape Town.

Tunde Williams is Head of Marketing for Europe, Middle-East and Africa

Tunde is on LinkedIn

Follow @MotSolsEMEA on Twitter and look out for #MCTA2018

Can your cell phone be used to steal your email password or fingerprint data? Can hackers access personal information from your heart rate monitor, fitness tracker or smartwatch? What may have once sounded like science fiction is rapidly becoming reality.

We now live in an era of connectivity – with digitally connected devices permeating every aspect of our lives. In fact, as soon as 2020, the number of connected devices will reach more than 21 billion. This level of interconnectedness is enabling people and businesses to do things never before imagined – from home automation to environmental monitoring. 

Today’s increasingly connected world is also introducing more attack vectors and more possibilities for cyber crime. Unfortunately, some of the most commonly used interconnected devices contain vulnerabilities. At a recent DEF CON, 47 vulnerabilities affecting 23 connected items – including webcams, door locks, thermostats and baby monitors – were disclosed. With these vulnerabilities, cyber criminals now have more entry points and can move laterally across networks. As a result, cyber attacks can have far more extensive effects than ever before. Despite this information, 80 percent of organisations do not routinely test their IoT apps for security vulnerabilities.

Developing resilience to withstand cyber attacks is critical to future success. Safeguarding software and connected devices – and making it as difficult as possible for exploitation – will help to improve overall organisation system security.

Organisations must be proactive and operate in a state of readiness. Embracing a holistic, risk-based strategy enables organisations to manage their risk awareness, security, detection, response and recovery. By focusing on mitigation options, continuous monitoring, diagnosis and remediation, companies are better able to protect themselves and proactively confront potential situations before they become an acute threat.

Read the full Motorola Solutions White Paper here to learn more about the emergence of new attack vectors and how a holistic strategy can help defend against emerging cyber threats.

You can learn more about our cybersecurity solutions at www.motorolasolutions.com/cybersecurity

Troy Mattern is Vice President of Cybersecurity Products and Services at Motorola Solutions.

Troy is on LinkedIn

Follow #ThinkPublicSafety, @MotsolsEMEA on Twitter

This post was originally published in our sister blog for North America - Fresh Ideas In Public Safety

My earliest memory of a ‘walkie-talkie’ is of a toy one I had as a child, and using it to communicate whilst out playing with my brother. It was great to just push the button and be able to talk.

With the availability of analogue and new digital radios, the situation is much the same. It still offered immediate connectivity through the ‘Push To Talk’ button. This immediate, fuss-free connectivity became essential for mission critical users such as Police, Fire or Ambulance who depend on them to help save lives.

Move into the early 2000s and cellphone users were asking to be able to connect ‘like radio users do’. This drove the development of new (infant) technology for providing a ‘PTT-like’ ability on 2G/2.5G cellphones but it was not reliable or robust enough for mission-critical applications.

Since then, cellular networks have rapidly advanced to 4G/LTE that supports bandwidth-intensive mobile data applications. PTT over broadband was developed to meet the needs of commercial users. PTT over mobile broadband has now been evolved to support mission-critical users too. Key to this evolution has been the development of international (3GPP) mission-critical standards:

Where does Motorola Solutions fit in? We continue to contribute to 3GPP standards related to mission-critical communications and lead the industry in standards implementation and compliance. Today’s mission-critical PTT users benefit from sub-second call set-up, high voice quality, numerous advanced features, as well as multimedia applications integrated on the same device.

What does this mean for Public Safety radio users? We recognise that when it comes to push-to-talk communications, one size, or in this case, one technology does not fit all. The right PTT communication platform should fit within your existing workflows, not the other way around. Our breadth of PTT solutions include PMR solutions (analogue and digital) such as ASTRO P25, TETRA and DMR standards as well as WAVE, our broadband PTT which operates over any broadband network.

The evolution of PTT has created a world of multiple technologies, and technologies that can interoperate. This enables each user to have the right technology for their situation. An example of the collaboration between technologies is Lowland Rescue:

Out in the field the rescue teams communicated by two-way radio and thanks to the interoperability provided by our WAVE solution, were able to keep a rescue-team member (at home) up-to-date with developments via a broadband connection.

Want to know more? Check out our new White Paper ‘The Evolution of PTT’

Mike is EMEA Solutions Marketing Manager at Motorola Solutions  
Connect with Mike on LinkedIn

Follow #ThinkPublicSafety, @MotsolsEMEA on Twitter