Next-Generation 911 expected to thrive as managed services accelerate market momentum

Next-Generation 911 Expected to Thrive in the United States as Managed Services Accelerate Market Momentum

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Frost & Sullivan’s recent analysis, Next-Generation 911 (NG911): The Future of Public Safety, Forecast to 2026, finds that in contrast to the legacy voice-centric enhanced 9-1-1 (E9-1-1) network, Next-Generation 911 (NG911) supports a more diverse set of internet protocol (IP)-based communications that will dramatically improve the speed, accuracy, and preparation of first responders.

NG911 represents an industry transformation that enhances public safety by acknowledging and catering to citizens’ rapidly evolving products, technologies and lifestyles. The total annual NG911 revenue opportunity in the United States is estimated to hit US$1.07 billion by 2026, up from US$689.1 million in 2020, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.6%. The COVID-19 pandemic and natural calamities, in particular, have elevated the pressure on US states and counties that have not initiated NG911 deployments to accelerate rollouts.

“NG911 market penetration, based on the percentage of the US population covered by closed NG911 contracts, is projected to reach 95% by 2026, up from approximately 60% in 2020,” said Brent Iadarola, Information & Communication Technology Vice President at Frost & Sullivan, in a statement. “Statewide requests for proposals (RFPs), where states have centrally organized their public safety answering points (PSAPs) to conduct statewide NG911 upgrades, have emerged as the preferred and most efficient approach to NG911 implementations.”

Iadarola added: “The entry of large integrators with one-stop-shop-as-a-service business models has accelerated the progress and reduced the complexity of NG911 deployments. A clear theme over the course of Frost & Sullivan’s research was that states often do not have the resources, expertise, or desire to manage the complexities of NG911 in-house.”

As NG911 infrastructure becomes more widely deployed, there will be significant growth opportunities for complementary solutions that seamlessly integrate with public safety infrastructure. In particular, NG911 can unlock lucrative growth opportunities by:

• Leveraging aggressive capital investments in 5G network technologies to drive innovative applications and compelling use cases in public safety that enhance incident intelligence and situational awareness for first responders.
• Providing an integrated, end-to-end platform for NG911 with advanced features such as cloud/edge computing, embedded security and data analytics supported by artificial intelligence (AI)/machine learning (ML) that offers a framework to expand opportunities across vertical markets.
• Offering modular, integrated additional data repositories (ADR) solutions that can be integrated with NG911 core infrastructures to effectively receive and distribute data to first responders and/or other relevant public safety entities.
• Developing ML and AI solutions to manage, organize, and analyze the massive amounts of new data sources now enabled with NG911 to differentiate between “relevance” and “noise” in an emergency.