Airwave Solutions Ltd.

was a British mobile communication company that operated the

Airwave network, a mobile communications network used by Great Britain's emergency
services. The Airwave network is based on the specialist Terrestrial Trunked Radio
specification. Airwave were acquired by Motorola Solutions in February 2016.
Contents [hide]
1 History
2 Airwave Network
2.1 Performance during 2011 England riots
2.2 Performance during the 2012 Summer Olympics
3 References
4 External links
History[edit]
Airwave was established in 2000 by Telefnica UK Limited or O2.[1] In April 2007,
Airwave was acquired by two Macquarie Group investment funds, Macquarie European
Infrastructure Fund II (MEIF II) and Macquarie CPPIB Communications Pty Limited,
for $3.8 billion (1.9 billion).[1][2] On 3 December 2015 the company was acquired
by Motorola Solutions for 817 million (~ US$1000K).[3] Some of the payment was
deferred to the following year and Macquarie were supporting the transaction.[4]
On 19 February 2016 Motorola Solutions announced it completed its acquisition of
Airwave,[5]
Airwave Network[edit]
Performance during 2011 England riots[edit]
During the 2011 England riots, several police officers experienced "significant
difficulties" with the Airwave equipment and were forced to use their own personal
mobile phones to co-ordinate strategy during the riots.[6] The Police Federation
review speaks of "significant local technical difficulties" and a "significant
communications failure," which was quoted in the Guardian newspaper.[6]
However, the National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) responded that the network
did manage to cover all 16,000 officers and that "[s]ome officers had to wait a few
seconds for their calls to get through, but fundamentally, the network proved to be
most resilient."[6][7]
Performance during the 2012 Summer Olympics[edit]
On 27 January 2009, the organizing committee for the 2012 Summer Olympics confirmed
that Airwave would provide private radio service for all venues during the Games
using its Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) but with a new and independent
communications infrastructure separate from the public safety infrastructure.[8]
The PMR network, named Apollo, provided voice communications for over 18,000 staff
and volunteers from the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic
Games (LOCOG) during the 2012 Games.[9]