Delivering solutions, not just equipment, crucial for modern-day radio dealers

Ultimately, QDS Communications developed a patented solution of software and hardware that provides a direct link between the MOTOTRBO systems often used in schools and the P25 systems used by many public-safety agencies. The link is activated by a 911 dispatcher, if it is determined that school personnel and first responders would benefit from direct communications.

More than 200 SchoolSAFE systems have been deployed, with most of them being located in Colorado, Hobby said. QDS Communications tried to install the solution at locations outside of the state but quickly realized “how brutally expensive and time consuming it was to try to reach out and work effectively in other states,” he said.

Recently, Motorola Solutions decided to help QDS Communications deploy SchoolSAFE in each of the 10 schools in the Chardon Local Schools district in a pilot program. It’s a relationship that would not have been considered had QDS Communications simply decided to sell equipment, Hobby said.

 “We’re not a dealer; we’re well beyond a dealer,” Hobby said. “[When QDS Communications was founded] back in 2004, one of our five contracts … is called a dealer contract. One of them is called a service contract. One of them is called a manufacturer’s representative contract. Another one is called an agency contract. And the dealer piece is the least valuable of the whole bunch, because that’s your commodity.

“SchoolSAFE is not a commodity.”