How Motorola Solutions is reimagining communications for the blue light sector

Motorola Solutions has a long history of supporting the emergency services, from pioneering the first police car radios to providing the communications technology used during the moon landing. Today, the company continues to shape how police, fire and ambulance services operate, integrating control room systems, mobile technology, AI and body-worn video.

We spoke with Mike Guida, Senior Government Marketing Manager UK&I, to explore how Motorola Solutions is responding to current challenges and what lies ahead for emergency services communications.

1. Let’s start with the big picture. What’s the story behind Motorola Solutions – how did the company get to where it is today in supporting emergency services?

Motorola Solutions has been a leading provider of police technology since 1930. People still tend to think of mobile phones, which is precisely not what we do anymore! People are also surprised to learn that Motorola Solutions was behind the comms for the moon landing in 1969, as well as providing the first police car radio in the States almost a hundred years ago!

The name ‘Motorola’ was created by linking ‘motor’ (from motor car) with ‘ola’, which was a popular company name ending back in the day. Think Crayola!

2. Motorola is a name most people in the sector know, but what do you think people don’t realise about the scope of what the company does today?

Today, we enable police officers, firefighters, and paramedics to work smarter and more efficiently thanks to an integration between body cameras, vehicles, radios, CCTV, and AI-powered mobility applications, including Pronto, which is used by over 70,000 police officers across over 50% of forces in the UK.

But it does not end there.

We are revolutionising Control Room technology, through Guardian, a centralised, cloud-hosted platform for ICCS (Integrated Communications Control System), CAD (Computer-Aided Dispatch), Mobile, and intuitive Contact Management capability which turns 999 calls into actionable insights, impacting time-critical situations (misper, child abductions), and helping to prevent serious situations such as domestic abuse from escalating to life-threatening levels. Furthermore, our mobile-first Record Management System (RMS) will transform the way that digital evidence and records are used.

3. What do you see as the biggest challenge facing blue light services right now and how is Motorola Solutions responding to that?

In terms of police challenges, we often hear about ways in which to improve the victim experience, transparency, and the public’s trust in policing, as well as having to manage staff retention, mental health, budget constraints, large volumes of data, interoperability, and the use of AI both effectively and responsibly.

Our entire public safety ecosystem directly supports many of these challenges including transparency and trust (body cameras, in-car technology), frontline cost and time savings (Pronto), managing data (control room and RMS technology), and using AI to supercharge major investigations and GSB command outcomes (facial recognition, video analytics) and improve 999 call handling (Guardian Contact Management).

Whilst many fire and rescue services are now embracing next-generation control room technology, the challenge – or perhaps opportunity – is deciding whether they would benefit by clubbing together with other FRS operations to form ‘Fire Hubs’ where control room technology is deployed on a shared, integrated platform to create a unified service for multiple FRSs, which fosters collaboration, standardises data, and improves incident response by allowing control rooms to work together.

Motorola Solutions is leading the way with several hubs in place, including Hereford and Worcester FRS, Shropshire FRS, Cleveland Fire Brigade and County Durham and Darlington FRS, which covers 77 fire stations and a population of 2.5 million people.

In terms of EMS challenges, paramedics are increasingly experiencing aggression when attending highly emotional incidents. With the help of our body cameras, their safety can be enhanced and situations can often be defused.

4. How do you see the role of data evolving in emergency services communications, and what’s your role in helping teams make use of it safely and effectively?

The proliferation of data sources (local authority and 3rd party CCTV feeds, body cameras, in-car CCTV, UAV, NPAS, social media) presents both opportunities and challenges when it comes to situational awareness, especially when policing public order events. Situational awareness is key to making informed decisions, anticipating potential risks, responding effectively to changing circumstances, enhancing safety, mitigating risks and improving overall performance in high-pressure environments.

But situational awareness is often impaired, when data sources are not joined up, or Bronze Command does not have the full picture from Silver Command or access to live CCTV, or there are no operational video analytics or facial recognition capabilities in the field to save critical time.

Motorola Solutions believes the only way to have true situational awareness is by joining all the dots. We can offer fully integrated capabilities including resilience and planning software, Cloud AI NVR enabling multi channel view, multi layered mapping, Retrospective Facial Recognition (RFR), Operator Initiated Facial Recognition (OIFR), and vehicle search during and post event.

5. Looking ahead, what are you most excited about in terms of what’s coming next from Motorola Solutions for the emergency services space? 

When it comes to Pronto mobile digital policing and Guardian control room technology, the development opportunities are endless, especially when the responsible use of AI is added to the equation.

We have also recently launched both the M500E, a new, simplified in-car video system, which is designed to capture video evidence and enhance situational awareness using AI video analytics, and V200, a more compact body-worn camera designed to enhance the safety and security of frontline workers especially paramedics, but it also has uses within police and fire.

6. If you had to sum up your mission to emergency services in one sentence – what would it be?

Connecting those who protect us all.

The industry will once again be gathering at the NEC, Birmingham for The Emergency Tech Show, co-located with The Emergency Services Show, on 17-18 September, check out the full exhibitor list here. You can find Motorola in Hall 4, Stand B110.