BroadWay awards framework agreements to four consortia

On 7 October, the the BroadWay Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) project signed framework agreements with the lead tenderers of four successful consortia – which are lead by Airbus DS SLC, Frequentis, Leonardo and Rohill – for the development of innovative solutions to provide broadband mobile communication services to enable public safety responders to be operationally mobile throughout Europe.

The BroadWay project team consists of 11 procurers from 11 European countries. They came together in May 2018 to procure innovation activity to enable a pan-European broadband mobile system for Public Protection and Disaster Relief (PPDR). ASTRID, the operator of the TETRA network used by the Belgian emergency and security services, is acting as the lead procurer.

The consortia will now develop the design of the solution and the procurers and public safety responder practitioners will evaluate their progress through the design, prototype and pilot phases.

The consortium led by Leonardo brings together Athonet, Bittium, Proef, Lancaster University, Iscom, RadioLabs, Università di Bologna, Telespazio, Telespazio France, UbiWhere and Vodafone Portugal.

Frequentis's key partners within its consortium are Nemergent, Halys and Etelm; while Euroband and Arico are acting as subcontractors.

A Rohill spokesperson said: “The consortium led by Rohill is convinced that the PCP Challenge is critical to enable true pan-European mission-critical broadband communications for PPDR organisations. The PCP Challenge is a unique opportunity to design, develop and demonstrate standards-based interoperability solutions that matches Rohill’s vision of open, secure and scalable mission-critical communication networks. Together with the experience, skills and commitment of our partner Strict and subcontractors Levi9, PrioCom, T-Mobile, Genaker, Druid and PentaTech, we are convinced that we can plan and execute the project according to the PCP Challenge.”