P25

When an emergency strikes, whether it is a multi-car accident or a hurricane, first responders need to coordinate an effective response. And at the heart of an effective response is the radio communications between officers in the same agencies and across multiple agencies. Around the world, public safety agencies have worked with industry leaders to develop and enhance a standard called Project 25 to enable interoperable communications.

Project 25 (P25) is a suite of standards for mission critical digital two-way radio communication equipment published by the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA). It is an evolving standard uniquely developed by both equipment manufacturers and public safety users to meet the needs of the public safety community around the world. The Project 25 standard enables interoperability between multiple manufacturer’s P25 products designed to the P25 standard.

Established and Fully Vetted standard

The Project 25 standard has a twenty year history within the public safety community. It was established in October 1989 when APCO (Association of Public Safety Communications Officials), NASTD (National Association of State Telecommunications Directors), NCS (National Communications System), NTIA (National Telecommunications and Information Administration), and NSA (National Security Agency) agreed to the creation of the APCO-NASTD-FED Project 25. Since the beginning, the standard has been unique in that it has had the involvement of public safety agencies along side industry leaders.

Worldwide Adoption

Project 25 is widely adopted by public safety agencies across North America including local, county, tribal, state, and federal agencies. It also has the support of the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The DHS Office of Emergency Communications in coordination with the Office of Interoperability and Compatibility developed the annual SAFECOM Recommended Guidance for Federal Grant Programs.

Around the world, government agencies from Australia to Russia to South America have also adopted Project 25 systems for their mission critical communications.

In addition, the P25 standard is adopted by many industries such as utilities, airports, transit, petroleum, and chemical companies that rely on mission critical communications and interoperability with governmental public safety agencies in an emergency.

Evolving Suite of Standards

The Project 25 suite of standards continue to expand as new technological enhancements and innovations become available. There are eight interfaces that make up the suite of standards with the most recent additions being the Phase 2 TDMA Common Air Interface (CAI) and the Inter-RF Subsystem Interface (ISSI).

Common Air Interfaces

The Project 25 CAI standard specifies the type and content of signals transmitted by compliant radios. One radio using the P25 CAI is able to communicate with other P25 CAI radios, regardless of manufacturer.

The CAI is the most widely deployed Project 25 interface in the suite of standards. It is available as Phase 1 FDMA protocol and will soon be available for Phase 2 TDMA protocol. The new Project 25 Phase 2 TDMA standardized interface will meet the FCC regulatory requirements for 6.25 kHz spectrum efficiency in the VHF, UHF and 700 MHz band plans. The TDMA standard adds a Phase 2 TDMA voice service to the existing Phase 1 FDMA trunked voice and packet data services available today.

Inter-RF Subsystem Interface (ISSI)

The P25 ISSI is a wireline, network IP-based solution which builds upon today’s P25 CAI. A key advantage of wireline interoperability solutions is that P25 systems with different system IDs, different user databases and different RF bands can be interconnected. Wireline solutions keep the traffic digitally vocoded and encrypted for greater performance and security. ISSI allows public safety agencies to:

· Utilize the coverage areas of existing connected networks, which might span thousands of square miles.

· Maintain secure, encrypted traffic across the networks.

· Roam on to connected networks and still talk beck to their home users and home dispatcher.

Other Interfaces

Project 25 has other interfaces including:

· Subscriber Data Peripheral Interface: specifies the port trough which mobiles and portables can connect to laptops or data networks.

· Fixed Station Interface (FSI): specifies a set of mandatory messages to support digital voice, data, encryption and telephone interconnect for wireline communication to a conventional fixed station.

· Console Subsystem Interface (CSSI): specifies the basic messaging to interface a console subsystem to a P25 RF subsystem.

· Network Management Interface: specifies the RF subsystem’s connections to computers, data networks, or external data sources.

· Telephone Interconnect Interface: specifies the interface to Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to support both analog and ISDN telephone interfaces.

For more details regarding these interfaces, please see the TIA (Telecommunication Industry Association) web site. www.tiaonline.org/standards/

Multi-vendor Sourcing

There are over twenty-five Project 25 equipment manufacturers and service providers offering a wide array of P25 equipment: stations, repeaters, mobiles, portables, consoles, software, test equipment, and services such as system integration and consultant services. The depth and diversity of these Project 25 offerings provides public safety agencies with the confidence that they have options to meet their needs.

Additionally, the competition within the Project 25 market space continues to grow and to drive new P25 product and service enhancements and innovations.

Join the Standards Process

The Project 25 standard is unique in that public safety practitioners are a part of the standards development process. Public safety practitioners can participate in the standards development process thru the P25 User Needs Sub-committee which defines and prioritizes user requirements for possible P25/TIA standardization. A Public Safety practitioner can also be a member of an APIC Task Group such as the TDMA task group which serves as the venue for drafting the standard documents.

Motorola Commitment

Motorola is proud to be part of the Project 25 standard, and along with other manufacturers provide extensive technical resources in the development and maintenance of the P25 standard. We continue to promote interoperability by participating in and offering informal and formal interoperability testing opportunities. In January 2009, prior to the Department of Homeland Security lab recognition, we led the industry with a multi-vendor interoperability event to provide agencies documented proof of interoperability. In July 2009, after DHS lab recognition, we performed multi-vender interoperability testing as part of the P25 Compliance Assessment Program (CAP).

Since the 1990’s Motorola has invested in Project 25, developing the ASTRO®25 portfolio of networks, devices, applications, and services. With over 200 ASTRO 25 systems and over 1.75 million P25 capable units deployed worldwide, we are committed to the standard and support thousands of public safety agencies as they meet their interoperability requirements.

As the standard evolves in the future, Motorola looks forward to a continued relationship with the standard body and public safety users to enhance interoperability for first responders.