Ilissa Miller, the President of NEDAS and the CEO of iMiller Public Relations, recently sat down with Dennis Burns, in-house public safety expert and sales manager of the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic Regions at ADRF and a NEDAS Advisory Council member, to discuss IoT and 5G convergence and more.
NEDAS, Ilissa Miller (N-IM) Question: Dennis, tell our readers about yourself.
ADRF, Dennis Burns (A-DB) Answer: I have been in the wireless space for a little over 26 years. I started at Ram Mobile Data working with 900 megahertz networks and then moved to Research in Motion, back when they had six employees, to work on what ultimately became the Blackberry product. I have worked with BellSouth and AT&T and in the Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM) and wireless spaces prior to coming to ADRF. Now as the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic Regional Manager at ADRF, I’ve been focused on both public safety and cellular solutions, working with system integrators, carrier partners and distribution partners to drive in-building and outdoor DAS for public safety in cellular.
ADRF, which is based in Burbank, CA, is celebrating its 20th year providing solutions for both commercial cellular and public safety space. Specifically, we’re all about wireless and the convergence of wireless communications and how public safety and commercial cellular are working together to make buildings safer. I’m the public safety expert and I also sit on the Safer Buildings Coalition as part of the Code Committee. Essentially, I deal with public safety solutions for things that go inside buildings so that police, and fire fighters can actually communicate during an emergency. I’m also on the Education Committee, which focuses on getting the message out as to what can be done to make buildings safer for both FirstNet technology, which is more on the commercial cellular side, and public safety communications for VHF, UHF, 700, and 800.
N-IM Q: You talked about ADRF’s mission and your participation in the Safer Building Coalition which our readers will appreciate. Shifting our focus to NEDAS, which is a unique community focused on various types of technology advances at the intersection of wireless and wireline, tell our readers about ADRF’s solutions focusing on convergence.
A-DB A: At ADRF, we’re looking at the convergence of 5G and where that’s going. As a company and as an OEM, we’re always looking to be steps ahead because we need to make solutions that are on technologies that are not commercially deployed yet. Our CBRS (Hotel WiFi alternative) solution is very big with Verizon, and is now out and available. Sprint is very big with 5G New Radio (5GNR), so we’re developing a 5GNR solution. On the T-Mobile side, they’re very much about 600 so we also have a 600 solution.
When you look a little further out, you know, you look at things like 30 gigahertz technology, which is also referred to as millimeter wave technology. Now you’re talking about the convergence in the category of retail and commercial, and the vision is that the technology is going to be a millimeter gateway and that it’s going to be sitting on the side of your home with access points inside your home to automate virtually everything that goes on. Whether it’s appliances, your phones, your TV, your lighting, basically anything that goes on within your home or business will be using millimeter wave. So we’re in the process now of developing a new millimeter wave solution. There will be trials by the end of the second quarter of this year and then deployments in a limited scale with Verizon later this year. There you have wireless roadmap convergence. You also have the convergence of public safety and commercial cellular with things like FirstNet.
FirstNet is a first responder network, it’s a 700 megahertz of spectrum that ensures that messages are getting through during the time of emergency when folks like EMS, fire, and police will be able to utilize that 700 megahertz spectrum.
N-IM Q: These advances in public safety are really important and there are a lot of different technologies underway. You mentioned CBRS, and 5G as examples.
As an annual sponsor of NEDAS, thank you very much, you have the ability to share insights about your products and services with our community. Is there something that you are interested to share today?
A-DB A: Yes absolutely! We certainly have enjoyed our relationship with NEDAS over the years and we’ve continued our support your efforts within our organization. You’re doing a lot of excellent things and we’ll continue to support that as we move forward into 2019.
Last year at one of your events was a conversation with commercial real estate professionals where we shared the stage with Boston Properties. NEDAS brings a lot of value to that space. We’re looking forward to that relationship continuing and hoping that as we talk about where carriers are going with new technologies and the convergence of IOT and 5G and different public safety technologies, that we can educate the community about codes and advancements for safer buildings and distributed antennae systems.
N-IM: Stay tuned. Readers will be able to learn more about these new technologies, new regulations, and everything else that is taking shape in the land of the wireless at the NEDAS Boston Symposium in July, where industry insights will abound. Thank you for your time Dennis.
You can meet Dennis Burns and Ilissa Miller at the upcoming NEDAS Boston Symposium, their big event taking place July 17, 2019, at Convene One Boston Place. The early bird registration date for #NEDASBoston ends on May 15th (less than a month away).
Mr. Burns, along with other members of the NEDAS Advisory Board, will be sharing more of his insight at the NEDAS Boston Symposium 2019. To learn more about Dennis Burns or ADRF, please visit http://adrftech.com/. To request a meeting with ADRF during NEDAS Boston Symposium — July 17, 2019, please click here.
