At the heart of the evolution of mission-critical communications for 30 years (and counting)
In the late 1980’s, an inquiry following the Hungerford Massacre, one of the UK’s worst shooting atrocities, highlighted the evolving need of mission-critical communications for the Emergency Services which led to the development of Integrated Communication and Control Systems (ICCS). ICCS revolutionised the management of incidents by seamlessly integrating radio and telephony services, taking emergency calls whilst maintaining radio contact with officers in the field. Our DS1000 was the first ICCS to provide that functionality and went live in Leicestershire Police’s control room in 1992.
The DS1000 was designed and delivered in partnership with our customers to address their rapidly evolving ‘wants and needs’ and throughout the 1990’s this was at the heart of the first ‘Communication Evolution’, adopted by Emergency Services across the UK and trusted for its reliability.
As radio technology evolved in the 1990’s the UK Emergency Services took the next step and rolled out the first dedicated, national radio network, Airwave; the second ‘Communication Evolution’. In support of this, the new DS2000 was the first to achieve Airwave accreditation and presented an opportunity to deliver truly transformative change, interoperability and collaboration between agencies.
The DS2000 was chosen as the backbone for a number of national services, and its reliability, scalability and resilient architecture helped the Ambulance Radio Programme deliver a new, consolidated control room service across the country – a service that has continued for over 20 years – and led to the DS2000 achieving the Queen’s Award for Innovation in 2008. As the final DS2000 deployments come to the end of their extended operations, most of the Emergency Services in the UK have migrated to the DS3000 to support their future operational needs.
The DS3000 introduced a VoIP connected client and IP based centralised audio mixing leading to a significant reduction in the infrastructure footprint of the solution and further improving its reliability and deployment options. The DS3000 continues to be at the forefront of delivering mission-critical communications and supporting the ongoing development of the Emergency Services Network, being the first to achieve both DCS and ESN NATS approval.
Our ICCS solutions have been the bedrock for the Emergency Services for over 30 years and continue to support an active roadmap and provide a platform for the future of converged and integrated cloud-based solutions that will take our customers into the third ‘Communication Evolution’.
To find out more, visit our website and learn more about our Integrated Communication Control System.
