FirstNet Celebrates 5 Years With New Mission-Ready Solutions

In celebration of its five-year anniversary, FirstNet announced yesterday it is launching a new suite of services it describes as “mission-ready to modernize first responders’ interoperable communications during both emergencies and normal operations.” New services include:

• Cell Booster Pro – an enterprise-grade mini cell tower that provides reliable connectivity for public safety on FirstNet, as well as employees and visitors on the AT&T commercial network.
• Enhanced Z-Axis for FirstNet to give public safety an “altimeter view” or vertical visualization that shows the relative positions of first responders and incidents, as well as the ability to mark important areas within the building.
• Public safety’s FirstNet fleet now has 150 dedicated deployable assets – including 50+ Compact Rapid Deployables (CRDs) – available to support first responders in all 56 U.S. states and territories.
• FirstNet Emergency Response Kit equips public safety agencies with a cache of 20+ FirstNet Ready® devices in a protective case to simultaneously recharge and immediately disperse to responders in the field following a major incident.

In addition to the new services, AT&T ESInet™ is now integrated with the commercial AT&T wireless network in an effort to provide faster and more accurate location of wireless 911 callers through device-based hybrid precise location technology.

Home security giant ADT is the first provider to integrate with FirstNet and now, PSAPs using AT&T ESInet can receive verified text alerts when an alarm is triggered. 

With the launch of FirstNet Rapid Response, public safety now has two choices for their mission-critical push-to-talk (PTT) solution, as well as enhanced land mobile radio interoperability capabilities to help modernize their communications. FirstNet PTT now supports mission-critical video streaming and calling over WiFi.

AT&T boasts it leads the NextGen 911 industry with over 1,400 PSAPs having adopted AT&T ESInet. This equates to a 29 percent market share, serving 64 million people across the country. FirstNet announced that, after five years, more than 19,500 agencies and organizations – accounting for more than 3 million connections nationwide– are using its network, which now covers, according to their release, more first responders than any wireless network in the country.