NetMotion announces diagnostic solution designed for use on FirstNet devices

Even after a public-safety entity chooses to subscribe to FirstNet, the NetMotion Diagnostics package can help officials determine if personnel are getting the coverage and data throughputs promised, Knopf said.

“It’s ‘Trust but verify,’ and that is very much one of the motivations here,” he said.

Fallin echoed this sentiment, noting that the FirstNet draft RFP contained very specific requirements for data throughput for each public-safety user at the cell edge.

“That’s a pretty specific metric, and I would imagine a lot of people from the states being rather particular about holding FirstNet to that,” Fallin said. “I don’t see them being bashful.”

In addition, the Diagnostics tool can help technical personnel determine how to best optimize operations, Fallin said.

“If your radio shop is experimenting with antenna placement, as an example, you’ll actually be able to track the differences in performance between one instance of the [vehicle modem] and another, where the difference is just where you put the antenna,” he said.

Finally, the Diagnostics software does more than assess the connectivity link between a device and the LTE base station, providing valuable input on numerous factors that can impact network performance, Knopf said.

“If test devices or officers are out in the field and not getting coverage, we’ve got that whole diagnostic capability to basically click a button—or automatically click a button, when certain events occur—and figure out what’s going on in the data patch between the device and back-end resources,” he said. “Where are there failures? Where are there problems? Is it a latency issue, a tower issue or something else?”