Samsung, AWS claim world’s first mission-critical comms video call

Being able to see the bigger picture first could literally be a matter of life and death for first responders, and aiming to provide such capability, Samsung Electronics and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have demonstrated what they claim is the world’s first video call using mission-critical push-to talk, data and video (MCPTX) a multimedia-based communications experience designed specifically for first responders and public safety officials.

MCPTX is designed to offer data and video communications capabilities surpassing land mobile radio (LMR) technology, which provides traditional voice-based services. It is said to open a new horizon in advancing public safety, enabling first responders to be simultaneously connected with hundreds of fellow responders with simplified exchange of videos, images, files and other data during an emergency.

This, according to Samsung, will help improve situational awareness and information accuracy, especially in times when public safety plays a pivotal role in local disasters or urgent threats. MCPTX users have the option to deploy the solution on their on-premise servers or AWS cloud platform.

The demonstration, conducted at Samsung’s lab in Korea, featured a line-up of the manufacturer’s latest MCPTX solutions and the implementation was based on 3GPP Release 14 5G specifications, enabled by the successful onboarding, integration and deployment on AWS cloud. One of the solutions used in Samsung’s MCPTX service platform was the Galaxy XCover FieldPro, a rugged first responder smartphone, purpose-built for public safety users.

The demonstration also set out to highlight the key benefits that public cloud networks can bring to an MCPTX deployment. This approach is said to enable rapid deployment and improve the scalability and flexibility of public safety networks for operators by reducing the time spent on in-house datacentre deployment and allowing them to adjust the use of resources as needed. Also, the service is said to be able to “seamlessly” failover to another part of the cloud as needed, increasing overall reliability.

“This demonstration showcases how [mobile] solutions can manage public crises and be readily deployed on public cloud platforms,” said Wonil Roh, senior vice-president and head of product strategy, networks business at Samsung Electronics. “It also enables us to learn and adapt to the evolving needs of service providers and users alike. This brings a new level of broad coverage, scalability and reliability to mission-critical service deployments, and we look forward to continuing our journey in the public safety sector to help keep communities safe and improve public emergency response outcomes.”

Samsung Networks’ mission-critical push-to-talk (MCPTT) solution has been operational in Korea’s public safety LTE (PS-LTE) network since 2018, supporting voice and text communications. It has been also commercially deployed across the nation’s LTE-Railway (LTE-R) network, providing communications for station staff and train crews. The new MCPTX solution is the upgraded version of the MCPTT with enhanced capabilities, enabled by 3GPP release 14.