Motorola and SF Bay Area LTE Public Safety Project Get $50 Million Grant

Motorola and the Public Safety Agencies within the greater San Francisco Bay Area received $50.6 million in grant funding today from the Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).


The NTIA grant will be funding the Bay Area Wireless Enhanced Broadband (BayWEB) program through the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP).


The BayWeb project will provide advanced communications capabilities for first responders and public safety professionals across jurisdictions in the Bay Area. The network will use LTE operating on 700 MHz frequencies.


BayWEB is a component of the Bay Area Regional Interoperable Communications System (BayRICS). BayRICS also consists of a P25 voice system, microwave system, and information sharing applications.


Motorola said the new BTOP funding will leverage Project Cornerstone, an LTE demonstration project using an experimental FCC license, to include the larger Bay Area utilizing almost 200 pre-existing sites. This demonstration is the first of its kind for Public Safety within the nation utilizing the 700MHz spectrum.


Additionally, this funding will provide a public access network to serve schools, hospitals, libraries and community colleges throughout the greater San Francisco Bay Area Region.


"Motorola is proud to participate in one of the first projects for public safety funded by the NTIA," said Greg Brown, CEO, Motorola Solutions. "The BayWEB project will directly address the many challenges that public safety faces in the Bay Area by providing first responders with a hardened public safety network that will be available in emergencies, natural disasters and catastrophic events, while also providing community anchor institutions, business and residential end users with affordable Internet access services."http://www.motorola.com/nextgenhttp://www.bayareauasi.org