Verizon Frontline has announced the completion of a communications upgrade for the New York City Fire Department (FDNY) with its Verizon One Talk.

“Working with, and through, our partner vendors and Verizon solutions architects, we were able to meet the short timeline to implement this solution so the FDNY could continue to serve and protect the citizens of New York’s five boroughs,”

Alex Sims, Verizon Business Client Executive for New York City said.

The project saw the telco Verizon’s public sector comms solutions arm replace a legacy central exchange (Centrex) phone system with a more modern and robust one.

First Responders’ System Needs

FDNY, the US’s biggest fire department, selected Verizon Frontline to provide an advanced, secure, and reliable connectivity solution after upgrading its Centrex system.

US government agencies have long relied on Centrex lines for their telecommunications needs, appreciating the outsourced management, feature-rich service, multi-location support, lack of on-site equipment requirements and with equipment costs having long since been paid for.

However, these systems are increasingly being phased out due to their limitations and drawbacks.

While Centrex offered initial cost savings and convenience, it has become relatively expensive as user numbers grow, lacks customisation options, and relies on shared infrastructure that raises security and reliability concerns.

In the US the usage of Centrex lines has fallen from 16.5 million in 2002 to 10.7 million in 2008 as users transition to IP-PBX (through VoIP).

Yet government agencies like fire departments have specific needs that other VoIP providers may not be accustomed to.

For instance, the FDNY responds to millions of emergency calls each year across New York City’s 302 square miles.

The department has 218 firehouses, 39 EMS stations, and additional support facilities like fleet services, fire alarm and emergency medical dispatch, and health services.

Therefore, unique requirements could include a system that supports high call volumes, provide communications in rugged conditions and offer integration with computer-aided dispatch systems, to name a few.

Here is where Verizon Frontline was able to help.

Verizon’s Feature Uplift for FDNY

The company delivered One Talk T67 LTE devices to serve as the new Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) solution.

A cellular solution, a standout feature is strength in connectivity.

Verizon Frontline asserts the system can keep employees connected almost anywhere. It has also won awards for its Wireless Network Quality, 31 times in a row.

Its interoperability allows employees to use mobile phones, tablets, desktop computers, and desk phones, making it suitable for rolling out communication across an organisation with spread-out staff.

Equally, Verizon Frontline’s intelligent platform automatically prioritises and preempts first responders’ voice and data communications so they can stay connected in times of high call volume.

Such is the utility found useful that the FDNY has since migrated over 2,500 existing Centrex telephone lines to Verizon’s One Talk wireless desktop devices within the past year, with the majority located at FDNY Headquarters.

According to the FDNY, the agency has been operationally assessing the solution for several months at various FDNY locations (Firehouses, EMS Stations,etc.) and have found that the devices have proven reliable.

The new system is designed to enable every person in the agency–from office workers at their desks running operations to fire marshals in the field–to communicate with each other at any time reliably.

More than 40,000 such agencies currently use Verizon Frontline for such mission-critical solutions



from UC Today https://ift.tt/ROUpJsc