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AT&T to Subcontract for California FirstNet

The president of AT&T California tells state lawmakers that his company will meet the challenges of implementing FirstNet partially through the use of subcontractors and interoperability.

All 50 states have opted in to FirstNet and AT&T has to serve them — but California is different.

The state is among the top 10 economies in the world, has some of the most varied geography, and is home to the nation's largest county and second-most populous city. So how will one company, focused on creating the first national first responder communication network, meet the needs of such a bellwether of a state?

Subcontractors and interoperability are part of the answer, according to Ken McNeely, president of AT&T California.

“Through our work with the governor’s office and Cal OES (Office of Emergency Services), we have committed to providing a solution that will support public safety mission-critical data for the next several decades here in California,” McNeely said Wednesday at a legislative informational hearing in Sacramento.

The overall project will cost AT&T about $40 billion over the 25-year life of the contract. It will build thousands of cell towers to harden the network from outage risk during emergencies.

AT&T also has a dedicated communications recovery team for emergency situations. That team has access to deployable hardware that can fill in gaps caused by geography. Wearable cameras and sensors over the Internet of Things are also part of AT&T’s plan.

Tahoe, Kings County and Tulare are all already migrating first-responder communications to the FirstNet system. And Los Angeles already has its own system, Los Angeles Regional Interoperable Communications (LA-RICS), that functions similarly to what FirstNet could do.

AT&T may also be teaming up with LA-RICS. LA-RICS has filed paperwork with the federal government to share much of its system, hardware and software to be included with the state rollout.

McNeely said AT&T will prioritize contracts with veteran- and women-run businesses, among the state's other priorities for contracts.

Kayla Nick-Kearney was a staff writer for Techwire from March 2017 through January 2019.