In the short term

It’s clear though that, for the short term at least, the ‘killer applications’ in the mission-critical sector will remain voice and appropriate narrowband data applications. Tom Quirke, vice-president at Motorola reminds us, “While work is obviously well underway on LTE, most customers in the public safety area still see what might be called ‘eyes up’ voice communications as their prime requirement – with all the strengths implicit to TETRA of encryption, group calling and an instantaneous connection. What focus there is here on applications more usually involves automating and data-enabling processes that would historically have involved extra voice traffic such as police identity, vehicle checks or report writing and the aim here is to save time and money. 

“There’s obviously a massive chasm between these types of application and those services, such as video, that broadband makes possible”, he adds. “As we make the journey, we’re obviously going to have to replicate many of the strengths and functions that make TETRA so useful – such as slaving off and synchronising with existing talkgroup structures – while the need for device longevity, robustness and ease of use and training will also require careful thought.”

As a final word, for applications to be successful, both vendors and users must be aware of what is becoming possible in this new infinitely connected world through increased interworking and sharing of skills and insights. Gert Jan R Wolf, founder of the TETRA-Applications website, comments: “The TETRA applications community has been very fragmented and localised with many small specialist technology companies needing help to get access to wider markets. In the 18 or so months since we launched the site, we’ve seen traffic constantly grow with over 350 companies now with a presence – and over 3500 registered users. The metabolism of this part of the TETRA community is finally speeding up!”