Towards future broadband public safety systems: Current issues and future directions

The vision of the Fifth generation (5G) of mobile communication is that it will be an umbrella for communications for various vertical industries that have different requirements for delay, data rates, reliability, availability, and security. 5G will not be a single technology - rather a convergence of not just new revolutionary technologies, but of the already existing, and evolving technologies as well. This paper analyses the impact of convergence and its importance to the evolution of critical communication systems, both with respect to the fundamental features of the public safety systems and the future broadband services that are becoming an integral part of the work of the first responders. This paper presents and discusses the recent standardization and research efforts in the area of public safety communication systems and indicates the technologies required to enable future broadband trusted communication system for safety and critical missions.