Don't miss your vital mid-year industry update

Comms Connect Sydney is only a few weeks away — 12 and 13 June — so if you haven’t registered to attend yet, now is the time to do so, as it is your not-to-be-missed opportunity to be updated on all the latest critical communications industry and technology developments.

Here’s some of what you’ll miss out on if you’re not there.

Australia’s PSMB: Luke Brown (Dept. of Home Affairs) will provide an update on efforts to achieve public safety mobile broadband for Australia, while Mary Egan (National Program Management Office for Public Safety Broadband) will outline how it will transform public safety in Australia.

FirstNet: Acting CEO Ed Parkinson is travelling to Sydney specially to share FirstNet updates, insights and use cases, as well as lessons learned from its first two years of deployment. He’ll also talk about the importance of global collaboration, including with Australia.

Standards: TCCA’s Tony Gray will share firsthand insights into the latest work by TCCA, ETSI and 3GPP on mission-critical open standards and their importance in enabling users to augment and combine open-standard digital narrowband with broadband data and voice services. He’ll also be taking part in the standards workshop on the Wednesday.

Smart cities: The IoT, 5G and other technologies are going to revolutionise our communities. Hear the latest thinking from Australian experts Ged Griffin (U. Melbourne), Geoff McKernan (Transurban), Geoff Spring (U. Melbourne) and David Williams (U. Melbourne).

Multivendor interoperability: Hosted by the Australasian Critical Communications Forum (ACCF) and The Critical Communications Association (TCCA), this workshop will feature a line-up of experts from Australia and abroad who will provide insights and practical examples of progress and options for existing and mission-critical 4G/5G 3GPP broadband alongside TETRA, P25 and DMR.

Mission-critical data: Station Officer Graham Tait AFSM (Fire & Rescue NSW) will explore how a mix of LMR, carrier cellular and satellite networks can bridge the gap between the needs of first responders today and the eventual availability of dedicated public safety broadband networks.

Security: Geof Heydon (IoT Alliance Australia) will tell you the things you need to be concerned about as well as best practices for protecting your business, your data, your sensors and your networks. A companion workshop will see NSW’s Chief Data Scientist, Ian Oppermann, go into more detail about data sharing and security and how to retain trust.

Technology: Multiple speaker sessions will cover the gamut of technologies such as 5G, wireless mesh, fixed wireless for IoT, tower auditing, multibearer switching and more.

International developments: Hear how other countries are tackling next-generation broadband communications, with presentations from leaders involved with South Korea’s Safe-Net and Finland’s VIRVE 2.0. There’ll also be a special Finnish session covering critical communications, as well as a Finnish pavilion on the exhibition floor.

Workshops: There are three workshops. The first covers critical communications standards for supporting a multivendor and interoperable environment. The second covers sensors, smart cities and their implications for critical control rooms. And the third is a special ARCIA Professional Development Training workshop on multicoupling and filtering.

Exhibition: Come and see the latest technologies on display from Australia’s major communications technology providers and pick the brains of their on-hand experts.

And there’s plenty more.

• Check out the full program
• Read the speakers’ bios
• View the exhibitor list
• Register online
• Get a free Exhibition Pass if you can’t stay for the conference
   

And don’t forget the ARCIA Industry Gala Dinner and networking drinks (to be held at the same venue on the evening of 12 June). This is your chance to mingle and network with other industry professionals from around Australia. And if for some reason you’re unable to catch Ed Parkinson’s conference presentation, the Dinner is where you’ll get a second chance to hear his insights into FirstNet’s first years of operation. Full details are available on the ARCIA website.

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