We want to congratulate Red Grasso, Charles Laird, and the NC DIT team for putting on a great event in Raleigh, NC this week. The North Carolina First Responder Emerging Technologies Technical Expo brought together a cross section of the first responder and technology community.

The sessions were informative and timely. The lunch sessions regarding the role of NC Public Broadcasting role in public safety and Cary, NC smart cities initiatives were very interesting.

Orion had multiple industry partners participating and displaying at the event including Sonim, JPS Interop, Cradlepoint, AT&T FirstNet, Verizon, and FirstNet Association. We look forward to participating in next year’s NC’s First Responder Emerging Technologies Technical Expo.

About NC DIT

The North Carolina Department of Information Technology is the leading provider of IT services to state agencies, local governments, and educational institutions across North Carolina.

To learn more about the North Carolina Department of Information Technology, visit their website or follow them on LinkedIn.

Keeping police officers safe while undercover isn’t easy

Officer safety is always a top priority for law enforcement agencies. This Western US police force runs many covert operations, from surveillance of suspected criminals to going undercover at large public events.

These events, like marathons, parades, and public demonstrations, increasingly run a risk of violent activity. Police departments, therefore, must find ways to blend in with crowds. Typically, with covert work, several plain-clothes officers go into the field while a coordinator monitors their whereabouts from a van or patrol car.

Police department leaders needed a way to facilitate back-and-forth communications between undercover officers and supervisors without drawing attention to the officers in the crowd.

To maintain cover for their officers, police chiefs knew they couldn’t use land mobile radio devices or similarly bulky tools. They needed a voice wearable that was easy to conceal and easy to use without sounding like a two-way radio.

Solving the problem with Orion

The clear choice was Orion, whose lightweight Onyx devices hide easily beneath a jacket or shirt and require officers only to push a button to reach the monitoring team.

Importantly, teams can use Orion with smartphones, which are ubiquitous enough not to arouse suspicion as agents work undercover. Using Orion, the department was able to discreetly communicate with its undercover officers. They could even coordinate operations without adding bulky equipment or compromising their officers’ identities.

In high-risk operations like these, absolute discretion is required to maintain officer safety.

Not only does that mean discreet messaging while embedded in a crowd, but it also means protection from third party interception. Messages sent through Orion are streaming and encrypted, which prevents them getting into the wrong hands. This layer of security protects officers involved in ongoing investigations. It also allows officers in the field to focus on the essential work of policing rather than technical concerns.

All this adds up to a police force that’s safer, more connected and coordinated, and more heads-up than before. Orion enabled a level of situational awareness that many police departments strive for but few achieve. The powerhouse combination of Onyx’s discreet communication with Orion’s location tracking is essential to the continued expansion of the department’s undercover operations.

Read the whole story

To learn more about how this police department protected their officers with Orion, read the complete case study.

By Jesse Robbins, Orion Founder and Chairman

I’m proud to announce that the Orion Push to Talk app for iOS is now FirstNet Certified and listed in the FirstNet App Catalog. When first responders use the Orion Push to Talk app on a FirstNet Ready smartphone, teams can respond to emergencies faster and more efficiently.

Orion Push to Talk connects public safety teams anywhere they are with the push of a button. Use the talk button in the app to talk to team members, or add an Onyx wearable to keep your phone in your pocket and still stay in sync with your team.

Last week, we also announced partnerships with the FirstNet Authority and ResponderXLabs to support our mission of improving communication and workflows for public safety. As a firefighter and EMT, I’m excited that today we’re taking take that mission a step further.

What is FirstNet?

FirstNet is the first-ever nationwide communications ecosystem exclusively for public safety. In partnership with the First Responder Network Authority, it brings a much-needed technology upgrade to first responders.

FirstNet helps law enforcement, firefighters and emergency medical service crews stay connected and share the information they need to help keep their communities safe and secure. It gives first responders an “always-on” connection so they can communicate – regardless of crowd size or network traffic.

How Does Orion Help First Responders?

My experiences in firefighting and emergency management repeatedly teach me the value of keeping teams heads up and in sync. With our voice-first platform and next-generation wearables and apps, Orion gives public safety teams a heads-up, eyes-free experience. Because they’re more situationally aware, first responders can communicate without losing focus, across any distance, anywhere in the world.

How Do First Responders Get Orion’s FirstNet App?

Download the FirstNet Certified Orion Push to Talk app directly from the App Store.

Or download the fact sheet to learn all about it:

Get the Orion Push to Talk for FirstNet® Fact Sheet

If you have a question about how Orion can help your public safety organization, contact our sales team at info@orionlabs.io or use the contact form at the bottom of this page. We’ve helped agencies throughout the world improve their public safety efforts.

Alliances will accelerate Orion’s entry into expanding market for real-time voice and location services for first responders

SAN FRANCISCO (Nov. 30, 2018) – Orion Labs, the award-winning mobile voice communication platform for teams, today announced strategic public safety alliances with ResponderXLabs and the FirstNet Association (FNA). Orion is committed to improving communication and workflows for public safety. These partnerships establish Orion as the next generation platform for real-time push-to-talk (PTT) and voice communication for first responders worldwide.

ResponderXLabs fosters a community of innovation to support the growing importance of technology in the public safety sector by showcasing cutting-edge technology specifically curated to solve first responders’ needs. The FirstNet Association is dedicated to the public safety ecosystem that brings together end users of the FirstNet network and those responsible for its continued development, evolution, and maintenance. Orion provides powerful, interoperable, and integrated push-to-talk and voice communication services so that public safety teams can address complex challenges, maintain situational awareness, and stay in sync anywhere.

“It is critical that the advances in mobile, wearable, and voice technologies quickly reach the millions of people who serve and support public safety organizations every day,” said Jesse Robbins, Founder & CEO of Orion Labs. “ResponderXLabs and the FirstNet Association are dedicated to improving and accelerating innovation, adoption of new technologies, and the creation of a new technology ecosystem that serves first responders. We are incredibly excited to collaborate with these organizations on this important mission and grateful for their support.”

“ResponderXLabs is honored to showcase Orion’s leading communication solution for voice, location, and AI-powered services,” said Bryce Stirton, Co-Founder & President of  Responder Corp. “ResponderXLabs and Orion share a common bond as organizations founded by first responders who are passionate about bringing cutting-edge technology with tremendous commercial potential to support the mission of public safety. We are excited to support Orion’s expansion into new offerings for the public safety market and to ensure that first responders have access to the best technology available.”

About Orion Labs

Orion Labs is transforming the way teams collaborate and work using the power of their voice. Orion delivers instant and secure voice and location communication across a constellation of connected devices, applications, and AI-powered services. The Orion Push to Talk app enables mobile teams to communicate without losing focus, on any device, across any distance, without boundaries. Orion also supports mobile devices with dedicated PTT buttons from leading manufacturers. Orion interoperates with traditional radio systems and provides real-time location services through a web-based interface. The company provides a powerful API and SDK for developers to build, integrate, and create new software and services powered by the Orion platform.

Orion was recently named an IDC Innovator, received an Edison Award for Voice & Hearing Technology, and won the 2018 “IoT Wearables Innovation Vendor of the Year” award. The company was founded by cloud infrastructure pioneers Jesse Robbins and Greg Albrecht, who were inspired by their unique experiences using traditional radios as first responders. Orion Labs is backed by leading investors and is based in San Francisco, CA.

Stay in touch with Orion Labs | Facebook | Twitter | Blog

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Media Contact

Racepoint Global

Allison DeLeo, 415-694-6700

press@orionlabs.io

Over 5,500 attendees from the public safety communications industry converged upon Las Vegas this month for the annual APCO Conference and Expo. Our Orion team had the privilege of meeting many public safety industry professionals, demonstrating the latest in our Orion Connected Voice Platform and push-to-talk apps. We also showed off voice bots like Panic Bot and Orion Translator, as well as Orion Radio Bridge.

During the show, our team noticed three major themes:

FirstNet Is Growing, Creating a Broader Public Safety Ecosystem

Over the past year, all 50 States plus Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia signed on to FirstNet, the wireless carrier for first responders. FirstNet’s mission of interoperability for first responders generated considerable interest among attendees at APCO. Visitors to the Orion booth often talked about what FirstNet would mean for their community or their business.

FirstNet is also helping create a broader public safety ecosystem. Manufacturers like Kyocera and Sonim are already certifying their devices for FirstNet. Other critical mobile infrastructure and device players like Samsung and Nokia are taking a stronger position in the market, too. From our experience at APCO, it’s clear that technology players are expanding and evolving to serve the growing needs of FirstNet and the overall public safety market.

New Players Innovate in Public Safety

The public safety technology ecosystem as a whole is growing, too. Public safety communications directors will be able to leverage brand new technologies to provide a high level of service to their communities. We were especially impressed by the new public safety entrepreneur platform Responder Corp and the computer-aided dispatch product Rapid Deploy. We also saw innovative products from Cubic that bridge traditional land mobile radio networks to other mobile services including the Orion Platform via the Orion Radio Bridge.

Public Safety Teams Use Integrations to Solve Tough Problems

As public safety teams adopt more and more technologies, they need those technologies to work together. One effective way to do that is through service and platform integrations. For example, the Orion connected voice platform integrates with the automation service IFTTT. Creating automations on Orion with IFTTT is a flexible way to customize services and tools for public safety teams.

If you visited us at our APCO booth, thank you! You likely have received an email inviting you to talk about how Orion can help your team. If not, email sales@orionlabs.io to continue the conversation.

Would you like us to call you to discuss how Orion’s connected voice platform can help your organization? Click “Contact Sales” at the bottom of this page and add your contact information.

Welcome to Orion Supports, a series focusing on how Orion’s technology is being implemented across different industries to improve productivity, strengthen communities, and even save lives.

One of those industries is healthcare, where Orion has valued a 5-year partnership with Rock Medicine (also known as Rock Med), an organization that has been providing free “non-judgmental health care” at events throughout the West Coast for more than 40 years!

In this edition of Orion Supports, we’ll share how Rock Med used Orion at this year’s San Francisco Pride weekend, an annual celebration described as “the largest gathering of LGBT people and allies in the nation.”

Rock Med relied on Orion at two large-scale events during the weekend: the SF Trans March on Friday and the larger SF Pride Parade on Sunday, both of which Orion has been supporting since its founding in 2013.

Sunday’s parade covers a large portion of downtown San Francisco. This year, Rock Med was advised to expect record numbers of participants and spectators — so they prepared to support up to 1.5 million people.

Initially, Orion was set up at this year’s event to assist Rock Med supervisors to locate medics to match them with patients in need, via GPS tracking. Its secondary purpose was for administrative and logistics communication, through Orion’s push-to-talk technology.

However, due to capacity and coverage issues with the primary radio system, Orion played a much more significant role at SF Pride than initially anticipated.

After several unsuccessful attempts to increase coverage with traditional radios, Rock Med quickly trained teams over-the-air on Orion use. Rock Med teams passed the training down the parade route, from team to team, to ensure those who were out of contact could re- establish communications, this time using Orion.

Without Orion, critical communication between medical dispatch and field teams would have been seriously compromised, taking the focus away from essential medical care and putting lives at risk.

At large events like these, Orion’s technology can help save lives, by simplifying logistical processes without taking attention away from the vital care EMTs provide.

Orion’s powerful platform, versatile features, and ease of use proved it to be a highly useful tool for Rock Med staff at this year’s Pride celebration. It’s a tool that can be quickly and easily integrated across industries and verticals to boost productivity and streamline communication.

“Orion has been an important tool for the Rock Med team over the past ve years, helping us save time and focus on the critical patient care we provide,” said Gordon Oldham, Executive Director at Rock Med.

To read or share the full story, check out the official case study. To learn more about Orion and try a risk-free trial, visit the main site.

Header photo by Charlie Nguyen.

Welcome to Orion Supports, a new series focusing on how Orion’s technology is being implemented across different industries to improve productivity, strengthen communities, and even save lives.

One of those industries is healthcare, where Orion has valued a 5-year partnership with Rock Medicine (also known as Rock Med), an organization that has been providing free, non-judgmental health care at events throughout the West Coast for more than 40 years!

Leading the partnership is Orion Co-Founder and CTO Greg Albrecht, who has been working with Rock Med for nearly a decade as an EMT, Dispatcher, and EMS Field Supervisor.

The ties between Orion and Rock Med go deep; in fact, Greg says his experience working with Rock Med has been highly influential as he’s led the development of Orion’s push-to-talk and connected voice platform since the company began in 2013.

One of the largest events of the year for Rock Med is Bay to Breakers, an annual foot race and street party, which draws more than 100,000 runners and costumed party goers to San Francisco each year.

With a course that stretches across the entire city of San Francisco, it’s challenging to coordinate emergency medical staff and provide them with the right tools to make their jobs easier.

As is typical with similar events, the Rock Med staff at Bay to Breakers rely on traditional radio technology for dispatch and medical calls, which have limited capacity and range. This year, the team also incorporated Orion technology to supplement their radios — and saw impressive results.

At such a large-scale event, one of biggest logistical problems is matching field teams with patients who need help. Traditionally, medical staff would try to stage teams throughout a venue, in hopes of having a team close to where people might call for help. With Orion, however, they’re able to track locations directly through the app, saving critical time and allowing EMTs to better focus on patients.

In one case, supervisors needed to locate a nurse to staff one of the critical care tents at the race. With Orion, they were able to pinpoint the nurse’s location quickly and easily communicate where to go.

While location tracking was the main intention of using Orion at Bay to Breakers, it also served as an important secondary channel for non-critical communications, such as coordinating the delivery of medical supplies across the city.

As another bonus, the Rock Med staff were able to use Orion on ruggedized smartphones from Kyocera & Sonim (which look similar to radios they’re accustomed to using), which made it incredibly intuitive to learn.

With Orion’s powerful platform, versatile features, and ease of use, it proved to be a highly effective tool for the medical staff at Bay to Breakers. It’s a tool that can be quickly and easily integrated across industries and verticals to boost productivity and streamline communication.

To learn more about Orion and try a risk-free trial, visit the main website.