Public safety deserves better

Morgan O’Brien, the founder and former chairman of Nextel Communications, presided over the growth of a wireless company that started small but eventually took its place among the wireless industry’s major players. In this exclusive interview, the keynote speaker at IWCE 2006 shares a few insights concerning the past and the present, as well as his vision for the future of public-safety communications.

MRT: Did the interference problems in the 800 MHz band surprise you?

O’Brien: I went through all the classic stages that someone goes through when something terrible happens. When the engineers first showed up at my door with the allegations, I entered the first stage, which was denial. It was like, “Leave my office because you’re telling me something that can’t be true, so therefore it’s not true.”

MRT: What happened next?

O’Brien: They kept coming back. It wasn’t something we wanted to hear, but if it was true, it didn’t matter how it would affect the company. It was a matter of life and safety. So I visited areas where the complaints were loudest and then talked to the board of directors to carve out a position for the company that would guide us in terms of the public-safety world and, in particular, this issue. Then we started an exhaustive effort to first figure out what was causing the problem, then to determine solutions, from both public safety’s perspective — What are they thinking the solution might be? — and from our side, what was feasible.

MRT: How did the discussions with public safety go in the early stages of the effort?

O’Brien: I told public safety that I already knew what their position was: Stop. But I also told them that if I went back to Nextel and said, “Stop,” I would be replaced and the guy who replaced me would say, “We can’t stop.” So that wasn’t an alternative. Of course, there were lots of things we could do short of “stop” to ameliorate the situation, but the reality was that while we could do things to lessen the effect of the problem, we couldn’t fix it without doing something radical. So I was given the task of finding a comprehensive solution. That led to our white paper, which eventually evolved into the Consensus Plan.

MRT: Of course, 800 MHz interference isn’t the only crisis afflicting public-safety communications. In fact, you have called such communications a “total disgrace.” What did you mean by that?

O’Brien: The wireless industry, all of us, has let public safety down. We’ve allowed public safety to have the most primitive technology, the most fragmented spectrum and inadequate resources that are attempting to keep 10- and 15-year-old systems — and worse — running. We have the unacceptable situation that the plumber who is working in the men’s room at the police station has a more sophisticated device for which he paid less than any of the people who are there trying to save lives.

MRT: How did this situation come about?

O’Brien: You have to have about a 30-year perspective to be able to answer that question. It has to do with the way spectrum has been defined over the years, the way it has been licensed, the way public safety has operated its systems and how it has procured the equipment. No one is at fault. Public safety simply is carrying the burden of history. Lots of stuff has happened, and for things to change, it’s going to take something big. It’s not going to be incremental, where suddenly it’s all fixed, and public safety is at the same point with their devices as [consumers] are with theirs. That’s not going to happen.

MRT: Then what needs to happen?

O’Brien: In the past, I have questioned whether I had yet to identify the ingredients for a solution or just hadn’t come up with the recipe. By the time I speak at IWCE, I hope to have filed with the FCC a proposal — developed by working with a number of industry veterans — for addressing this. We have collected ourselves in a company called Cyren Telecommunications. We believe we now have the recipe. It will involve doing what we have been doing so well in wireless, but now doing it for public safety.

MRT: Can you offer any specifics?

O’Brien: It involves creating a network designed for public safety, by public safety, under the control of public safety, but in a unique relationship with multiple commercial partners. It’s not just carriers. There are many people in the industry who can contribute to the solution who currently aren’t carriers; basically any company that has hardware or software that could contribute to the creation of a next-generation public-safety network that will bring public safety up to the rest of the wireless world, which I’ve been maintaining for years is where they ought to be.

IWCE 2006 basics

Location:

Las Vegas Convention Center

Technology workshops:

Mon., May 15 and Tues., May 16, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Conference sessions:

Wed., May 17, 11:00 a.m. to 5:45 p.m.; Thurs., May 18, 11:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.; Fri., May 19, 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

Exhibits:

Wed., May 17, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.;
Thurs., May 18, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.;
Fri., May 19, 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Conference tracks:

Spectrum Utilization; Land Mobile Radio; Broadband Mobile Data; Emerging Technologies

Keynote:

Morgan O’Brien, co-founder and former chairman of Nextel Communications, Wed., May 17, 8:30 to 10:30 a.m.

Networking reception:

Wed., May 17, 6:00 to 8:00 p.m.

Spotlight sessions:

“Katrina — Prepare for the Future,” Thurs., May 18, 8:30 to 10:00 a.m.;

“800 MHz Rebanding — Where Are We Now?” Thurs., May 18, 1:30 to 2:30 p.m.;

“State CIOs — A Sampling of Successful Communications Initiatives,” Fri., May 19, 8:30 to 9:45 a.m.

More info: www.iwceexpo.com