Safety net

A contract to develop a backup communication system for the UK’s emergency services has been announced by O2.

The UK mobile phone giant, currently the target of a £17.7bn takeover bid from Spain’s Telefonica, has claimed that the system will make the UK’s emergency services the best connected in the world.

O2 Airwave, an advanced digital communications service for the emergency and other public safety (blue light) services, was awarded the contract by the Police Information Technology Organisation (PITO) to deliver a National Fallback Service (NFS).

This follows the announcement in July that O2 Airwave will be supplying the service to the Ambulance Trusts for England, bringing the value of new business won this financial year to £750m.

Used by more than 130,000 officers across police forces throughout the UK, Airwave is designed to set up a seamless network across the country. NFS, however, will deliver a standby duplicate switch network that fully replicates the existing airwave switch network. The company claimed that this development is unparalleled in the delivery of public safety communications anywhere in the world.