Seamless switching between GPRS and Wi-Fi networks is starting to arrive - and one of the first to benefit is the London Ambulance Service.
The ambulance service is testing technology from the UK’s Broadbeam to switch between five different networks according to their priority, using Wi-Fi in the depot to download maps to get to a patient, and GPRS when out of range, to transmit vital patient data back to the hospital.
“It used to take approximately one minute to pass the call details to an ambulance crew by voice and then the crews may have needed to look where the destination was in their map books. Now it takes typically two seconds for all the call details to be sent to the ambulance, and the PC in the vehicle tells the navigation equipment where the destination is,” said Quentin Armitage, deputy director of technology at London Ambulance.
The ability to connect to different networks and switch between them is a new feature in version 3 of Broadbeam’s Mobile Solutions System (MSS) Smart IP version 3.0 middleware platform (pdf) which the ambulance service is testing.
The feature, called IntelliSwitching, allows users to predefine which networks to connect to and in which order. “We can automatically detect the available networks, seize that network according to a user-defined order, and authenticate the user,” said Janet Boudris, chairman and CEO of Broadbeam. If a call is dropped the software automatically re-authenticates the user and, using what is called check point restart, picks up the data flow from the point at which it was dropped.
The company s Uni-Fi Networking Initiative (Uni-Fi) ensures a true one-networked experience for mobile personnel regardless of the number of Wi-Fi and 2G+ networks used.
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