SCHAUMBURG, IL, Jan. 27, 2006 ? Motorola (NYSE:MOT) has found a way to ease the transition to new spectrum for public safety radio communications. More than a year in the making, Motorola has developed software that enables equipment critical to public safety communications to be rebanded to a new segment of the 800 MHz spectrum in order to provide less interference for public safety radio communications.
The developed software has been tested and will be available approximately three months ahead of schedule.
Public safety radio systems---those used by police, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, and other systems operating on the 800 MHz band---have been experiencing interference as a result of commercial wireless carriers operating in the same or adjacent spectrum bands. To alleviate the interference between the two types of systems, the FCC has ordered a reconfiguration of the 800 MHz band, moving public safety to a lower segment of the band and commercial cellular networks to a higher segment. The developed software is needed by radios that use the NPSPAC (National Public Safety Planning Advisory Committee) portion of the band.
Motorola has made the spectrum swap easier to manage for first responders by creating software that allows the radios they use every day to instantly understand which band plan is in use at a given site. The new software simplifies the transition by providing full interoperability throughout the transition.
In addition to creating the new software, Motorola's testing facility conducted over 13,000 test cases to develop the most robust solution possible, across each of the 90 platforms that were involved.
?It was important to Motorola to get this critical milestone completed early so that we can help move the FCC's process along and minimize disruption to our customers as they transition to the new frequencies,? said Tony Marshall, Motorola's General Manager overseeing the 800MHz rebanding program. ?We?re very proud of the early completion on such an immense effort undertaken by our software design and test teams and look forward to assisting our customers throughout the rebanding process.?
