Motorola on a critical mission for mission critical technology

At AfricaCom 2017, I had a chance to an exclusive sit-down session with some o Motorola Solutions’ staff and a showcase experience of their stand there, and one thing stood out, they are highly innovating with AI for critical technology especially in the public safety. Danani Longwe, Motorola solutions General Manager for Sun-Saharan Africa agreed, saying any old company stays around if they keep innovating.

What is Critical Technology?

According to Defined Term it is ‘technology or technologies essential to the design, development, production, operation, application, or maintenance of an article or service which makes or could make a significant contribution to the military potential of any country. This includes, but is not limited to, design and manufacturing know-how, technical data, keystone equipment, and inspection and test equipment.’

The pace of digital technology is at a faster rate than ever before, and being in a digital era means we’re in an exponential era. The progression in technology is not linear and thus there is a need for new paradigms in business models e.g digitalization and modernization, and ultimately increase data traffic in the region. .cs required as part of this critical technology as crimes become more complex and shift online. Companies have to evolve in security procedures as crime complexity increases.

“In employment, jobs have to be alternated as new sectors come up with new technologies such as AI. It’s getting harder to predict the future unless we change to an exponential mindset.” – Longwe

In the future we’ll be talking to bots instead of dispatchers in emergency systems, and this technology must be precise in understanding speech by humans to make the right communicative command. There will also be much more interactive technology around us anywhere we go.

“Sensors will be everywhere, we already see fitness bands, but in public spaces they’ll be based more contextual awareness.” – Longwe.

The ‘Eyes up, Hands free’ system for the police service might help, as they are technologies that are integrated into their outfits to reduce the need of looking down at a device while dealing with a situation, increasing their awareness. Everything they may need to see on device will be available in special glasses that they wear which come with facial recognition and a voice assistant. Facial recognition may help in cases of identifying missing persons and amber alert victims on the street, for example.

What any company building products in the critical technology space must do is understand the challenges that consumers face and co-create new technology with them to solve the problem.

What is the point of all this? Longwe responded:

“We’re not trying to replace human aspect, we’re just augmenting capabilities.”

At their AfricaCom booth Motorola showed off some of its new or improved technology including two-way radios and security systems. Some two-way radios have been modified to include text messaging, reducing noise when one of the users may be trying to communicate silently. It also has computer systems that allow for video recording and monitoring (think CCTV). The products are too numerous to list but check out everything here.

Asked how Motorola will ensure that this new technology has support systems in place for every region the company operates in, Longwe responded saying that support will be done through partners who undergo consistent skills training updates when new products are deployed to any country.

There is also a consideration of new infrastructure building to support new technology in countries that lack it, and obviously this new critical technology has to comply with that particular country’s laws/policies. A balance has to be struck between privacy and safety.