Today Skymira released a device called the Skymira P25 IP Relay. It creates a highly secure, portable P25 network that transmits audio, subscriber ID, GPS location, and emergency alerts from P25 radios over an IP network.
Essentially it is a mobile, portable, or fixed-site network that can be deployed anywhere. It provides secure, reliable push-to-talk communications for a wide variety of previously unserviced and underserved users and situations.
I see a great market for this in disaster response, oil and gas, remote wind farms and solar farms, and especially public safety. I also think that this could be an onsite node to pass P25 traffic and provide in building coverage as opposed to having to install a BDA or DAS system. Pricing is not posted but I’m sure that it is probably at least 50% cheaper than a DAS system and install.
According to the website it is vendor agnostic which allows it to work with P25 radios from all major brands including Motorola, Kenwood, EF Johnson, Harris, Tait, BK, and others. It is optimized for satellite with very low bandwidth requirements, and works over private and public internet networks including satellite, LTE, FirstNet, fiber, and others.
The Skymira P25 IP Relay passes GPS location, subscriber ID, and man down alerts from P25 radios via an IP network and back into your system.
It stays online during outages and natural disasters like hurricanes and infrastructure failures like power outages.
To me this is ground breaking technology and I see a plethora of use cases. Currently in Texas we have operation Lone Star which provides support to border towns by supplementing law enforcement personnel to assist local agencies. I know first hand that coverage out there is splotchy at best. This would allow agencies that are coming to assist from all over Texas to have seamless communications with local agencies, DPS, and CBP in a deployable package.
The P25-IPR/Skymira also provides AVL (GPS Location Capability) so that any handheld or mobile radio on the network can effectively be located. This is a game changer when officers have to chase people miles into the brush.
I look forward to researching this more and possibly trying one out along the border with a customer and will update this post with any information I find out.
-Update: Use Case: US Secret Service, Department of State Diplomatic Security Service, and other agencies fly all over the world providing dignitary protection to presidents and world leaders. They could put one of these in a command post, embassy, or motorcade and effectively use their existing radios to communicate back to a command in the continental US completely AES-256 encrypted.
Brian Martin, CEO
Global Communication Services, LLC
Credit- Skymira
