IP systems enhance Brazilian smart city initiative

For nearly four decades, Savana Comunicacoes has provided Clear-Com technology for a wide variety of applications, including broadcast, live events, corporate, house of worship and industrial projects. Now, in partnership with Painel Multiservicos, Savana has extended its reach into public and government sectors in five Brazilian cities to aid police and emergency services as part of Brazil’s smart city initiative.

Initiated by Ricardo José, Technical Director at Painel Multiservicos, the result is an easy-to-use system utilising communication over IP that speeds up response time and enhances the ability of emergency services to coordinate and react to virtually any type of issue that might present itself in the urban landscape.

“When it comes to law enforcement, police and civil defence, as well as SAMU [Brazil’s ambulance service], these teams cannot afford to wait for communications in the middle of a catastrophe,” José said. “They need access to immediate communication. Their core business is mission-critical tasks, so they adapt and benefit the most from the solutions Clear-Com delivers.”

Savana’s Director of Engineering, Joao Pedro Machado Homem, describes the system as “cloud comms” — an idea that became a reality during the pandemic, a means of expanding Savana’s services while adapting to the growing trend of intercom as a service. They rent IP ports on an Eclipse HX Digital Matrix Intercom System (Omega Frame) with an E-IPA card, which is installed in Savana’s technical centre in Rio de Janeiro and connected to the public network. Then, they rent out Iris panels, Clear-Com headsets and Agent-IC licences for all users to communicate remotely out in the field. It’s a system that works seamlessly: “They install the panel, I send the IP address and password, and it just starts to work,” Homem said.

Since the initial implementation of the system in the cities of Indaiatuba and Barueri, three additional municipalities — Maua, Jundiai and Tatui — have adopted it. While Tatui was the last city to adopt the system, “it’s the most exciting one” according to Homem, citing how effective it was during a popular festival celebrating the city’s candy industry, Feira do Doce, in July 2022.

Tatui’s Clear-Com system also strengthens security in public schools, allowing emergency services to communicate effectively and respond more quickly to any situation with precision and efficiency. The schools already have ‘smart’ security cameras that automatically send an alert to police when necessary, Homem said: “But cameras and information aren’t enough. You have to be able to communicate and send that information to the proper people in the emergency services so they can take action.”

For Tatui, where theft from public schools has been an ongoing issue, it’s an important partnership. “The communications technology they supplied us with is fast and instantaneous,” said Elizângela Cecilio, Secretary of Education for Tatui. “This has been greatly beneficial for the safety of our children and employees, and we want to tell our friends, [and] the municipal teams in neighbouring cities, so they can also implement Clear-Com’s technology in their communities.”

Ultimately, the system dramatically improves productivity and efficiency for all those currently using it, said Francisco Carlos Severino, Director of Security Strategies for Tatui. “We used to work blindly, receiving or even checking an occurrence without having information in real time,” he said. “This results in far quicker response times regardless of the situation.”

The system also enables fluent cooperation between the five cities, allowing law enforcement and emergency services to communicate with their counterparts in other jurisdictions to provide seamless security. “We’re always working on improving the service when there is an alert,” said Marcos Roberto, Deputy Commander of Tatui’s police force. “This kind of monitoring system works really well for us, and Clear-Com’s quick response time, service and support made it easy to deploy the new technology.”

Homem said this is only the beginning, adding that the goal is to deploy Clear-Com technology in more areas of Brazil as 5G connectivity spreads. “Now we have five cities that can talk to each other over IP, so they can cooperate. The next step is to use Agent-IC in police and emergency vehicles instead of radio.”