Taking a flexible approach to keeping mobile devices on the road

With Panasonic celebrating 30 years of its well-known TOUGHBOOK, a ruggedised tablet that can be found in fire appliances and other emergency vehicles, UK and Ireland Head of Marketing, Dan Creasey considers what keeps it fresh for the coming years.

What brings you back to The Emergency Tech Show year after year?

The Emergency Tech Show is great for us because you get such a great mix of people from across police, fire and ambulance all under one roof. It’s a useful opportunity to catch up with existing customers, to hear what challenges they’re facing and have proper conversations with people about what they need from their technology. We always come away with new ideas and feedback that can go straight into what we do next.

With budgets under pressure, what is Panasonic doing to help services face this challenge?

It’s obviously something we’re hearing a lot about at the moment. The conversations we have tend to be less about the purchase price of a device, it’s all about what that technology is going to cost over its whole lifecyle.

A big focus for us is helping services keep equipment in use for longer. That means devices designed to be repaired and upgraded, backwards compatibility with things like docks and power supplies wherever possible, and service options that can help prevent a relatively small issue becoming a device replacement. This doesn’t just mean services save money on not needing to upgrading accessories, but also, don’t need to take a vehicle off the road to get it refitted each time a new device is launched.

We’re also seeing more interest in our Mobile-IT As-A-Service managed service, where customers can move away from large upfront capital purchases and instead have a more predictable resource cost covering the device, services, accessories, support and lifecycle management. For organisations dealing with ever tighter budgets, that can make planning, financially and operationally, much easier while also helping them keep their device estate current.

What are you doing to improve longevity of your device in the field?

It all starts with how the devices are designed. Ruggedness is obviously part of that (it’s a TOUGHBOOK after all) but increasingly so is modularity and repairability. If a port, battery or component can be replaced rather than the whole device, that makes a big difference over a five or even ten-year deployment. And yes, we have 10-year-old devices still working out in the field.

Battery technology is another big area of focus for us. We’re continuing to work on improving battery life during a shift, but also the lifespan of the battery itself. The aim is to reduce how often batteries need replacing while still giving users the runtime they need in the field. There’s no point having a 24hr battery if it only last one year.

We also try to maintain compatibility between generations, so replacing the computer doesn’t automatically mean replacing every dock, charger and accessory connected to it.

Then there’s the service side. We have our service centre in Cardiff, where devices can be repaired, reconfigured locally and quickly, then put back into service rather than simply being written off. Not only is that better for the customer, but it also helps stop more technology ending up in landfill.

Police officers need resilient mobile tech, what does Panasonic offer the busy beat officer?

For a frontline officer, I think the important thing is that the technology almost disappears into the job. It needs to start reliably, in all weather conditions, stay connected to the Internet, have enough battery to get through a shift while also survive being dropped, knocked. The last thing they need to be thinking about at an incident is their laptop’s battery life or if it’s going to get a bit damp.

We can provide not only rugged tablets and laptops that work both in-vehicle and away from it, with options around carrying accessories, desktop docks, keyboards, connectivity and accessories depending on the role. That could mean an officer using the same device for information in the vehicle and then taking it with them when they leave the vehicle, rather than having multiple devices weighing them down.

The Ambulance Radio Programme sees many of your devices in the front of vehicles, what else can you offer ambulance trusts?

The Ambulance Radio Programme is probably the most visible example because the devices are right there in the cab, but we see the opportunity as much broader than simply supplying a mobile data terminal or MDT as they are commonly called.

We can support the whole mobile environment around the ambulance, including rugged devices for clinical and operational applications, vehicle integration, docks and mounts, connectivity, accessories and ongoing support. Because we work across the complete solution, we can also work with trusts and several trusted technology partners on how information moves between the vehicle, the crew and the control room, rather than looking at the computer as an isolated piece of hardware.

Outside the ambulance itself, we also work closely with Ortivus. Our TOUGHBOOK G2 is integrated into their MobiMed ePR solution, which supports crews from dispatch and navigation right through to clinical documentation and patient handover.

How are you ensuring that Panasonic products are ESN-ready?

We’ve been involved with the Emergency Services Network programme for a long time to make sure we’re ready to go, rather than treating it as something we need to retrofit at the last minute. The TOUGHBOOK 33 was the first Microsoft Windows device authorised for use on ESN, and we will continue to put our newer devices though the same certification so services know they are ready.

TOUGHBOOK celebrates its 30th anniversary this year, will you be sharing any new developments at the show?

Thirty years is a big milestone for us, personally it feels like yesterday we had our 20th, particularly when you think about how much mobile technology has changed since the first TOUGHBOOK appeared in 1996. The Internet was barely a thing back then, for instance.

We’ll definitely be talking about where the range is heading next, although I’ve been sworn to secrecy. It’s definitely worth visiting us on our stand, as we may have some exciting updates we can share.

What I can say is that we’re continuing to invest in the areas our emergency services customers keep asking us about: longer device life, better connectivity, more flexibility and technology that can adapt to different roles rather than forcing everybody to work in the same way.

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Panasonic is a Premier Partner at The Emergency Tech Show 2026, taking place at the NEC on 16-17 September, and will be exhibiting on Stand B85. Register for your free ticket here.