BlackBerry today announced that its AtHoc Software Division has secured a major new customer in France. The city council of Rosny-sous-Bois (Mairie de Rosny-sous-Bois), a town with a population of 44 156 residents, located 19 km East of central Paris, in the department of Seine-Saint-Denis, has subscription-based for three years of AtHoc Services, to automate and enhance its emergency alert and crisis communication systems.
Many cities in Europe are seeking to improve their emergency preparedness and response in light of recent terrorist attacks in several countries. From 2014, the Mairie de Rosny-sous-Bois started to consider the best options available in the market and finally chose AtHoc as the best solution to develop its municipality safety plan.
The town, which has already a video surveillance system in operation now, relies on AtHoc Software to optimize crisis situation management (fires, floods, natural and technological damages, potential terrorist attacks, etc.) for the whole municipal territory.
In particular, AtHoc extends those eyes-on capabilities by enabling elected officials and municipal employees located anywhere in the town to send photos and videos during active incidents, as well as to receive automated real-time alerts to coordinate emergency response.
“This system gives us the technology we need to respond as quickly as possible in case of a crisis situation, alerting the right people in real time and helping them to make the right decisions,” said Claude Capillon, mayor of Rosny-sous-Bois.
“Thanks to AtHoc, every member of our team can now act as eyes and ears – not just the police, but all of our municipal resources. We now have the ability to know what is happening sooner, and to take steps to protect our people. Adopting this technology enables us to communicate better during emergencies and we want to connect soon with people in charge of internal crisis management, such as our municipal police, roads office, and social services, or, ultimately, people in charge of external crisis management, such as national police or protection teams, or even other cities in the greater Paris area. And we hope that other French cities will replicate our approach soon.”
Superior capabilities and affordability were key drivers for the purchase, according to Menahd Ouchenir, who is in charge of Communication and Digital Town for the Mairie de Rosny-sous-Bois. “I could see that the AtHoc solution that works for big organizations can also meet the needs of town councils. We were particularly interested by the multichannel transmission capacity of the solution. So, our teams can be reached at all times by mail, SMS, mobile applications, telephone or Pop-up PC to share information, send alerts about an incident, manage emergency situations, and escalate incidents to the appropriate authorities sooner,” Menahd Ouchenir said.
AtHoc’s highly secure platform delivers critical information to government staff, private businesses, and other local and regional organizations during emergencies. Its interoperable, networked crisis communication technology coordinates rapid response to accidents, severe weather, explosions, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, emergency incidents, and other urgent situations.
“We are honored to be selected to help protect the city of Rosny-sous-Bois,” said Ly Tran, Senior Vice-President at AtHoc.
“We offer a multilingual, international solution, and look forward to bringing our networked crisis communication capabilities to more French cities, as well as to other parts of Europe and the rest of the world.”
