Avaya Takes Seat on Committee for NGO Promoting Emergency Services Awareness in Europe

Markus Bornheim appointed as Vice Chair to European Emergency Number Association (EENA) Technical Committee 

Guildford UK, February 6 2017 – Avaya announced today that Markus Bornheim, EU Consulting Sales Engineer for Public Safety and Emergency Services, has been appointed as Vice Chair of the Technical Committee for the European Emergency Number Association (EENA),  a committee dedicated to providing expertise in emergency services in Europe.

Set up in 1999, EENA is a Brussels-based non-government organization (NGO) dedicated to promoting high-quality services reached by the 112 number in the EU. The Technical Committee works to establish requirements to make emergency services accessible via IP communications, and interoperable with next-generation networks.

“While we are all accustomed to using a range of communications in our daily lives, standard voice communications still remain the primary way to reach emergency services,” said Markus Bornheim, Avaya Consulting Sales Engineer for Public Safety and Emergency Services in the EU. “Extending full access to emergency services, using any modality, can literally be the difference between life and death for people in crisis situations. I am extremely proud to be able to bring my industry expertise to bear in this extremely important role and look forward to working with my fellow members of the Technical Committee.”   

Avaya, which has made improving all citizens’ access to emergency services a focus area for the business communications company since its inception, is pioneering a number of public safety initiatives globally. “Markus’ participation in EENA made him an obvious choice to fulfil this role in the EU,” said Mark J. Fletcher, Chief Architect Worldwide Public Safety Solutions. “Having Markus on the ground in the EU ensures we are capturing the requirements for public safety globally.” he added.

Specifically for the UK and EU markets, the company has developed a solution for emergency services contact centres to support the newly mandated eCall (Emergency Call) functionality, whereby in the event of an incident, telemetry data directly from the vehicle can be sent to emergency services, providing relevant information about the vehicle, its location and its occupants. In the EU, including the UK, all emergency contact centre services must be ready to support eCall by 1st October 2017, and all new car models type approved after 31st March 2018 must have eCall modules fitted.

In Europe, Avaya supports more than 600 emergency services contact centers, serving more than 150 million citizens, and fielding more than 80 million calls a year.

About EENA
EENA, the European Emergency Number Association, is a Brussels-based NGO set up in 1999 dedicated to promoting high-quality emergency services reached by the number 112 throughout the EU. EENA serves as a discussion platform for emergency services, public authorities, decision makers, researchers, associations and solution providers with a view to improving the emergency response in accordance with citizens' requirements. EENA is also promoting the establishment of an efficient system for alerting citizens about imminent or developing emergencies.

The EENA memberships include more than 1200 emergency services representatives from over 80 countries world-wide, 75 solution providers, 15 international associations/organisations, more than 200 Members of the European Parliament and over 90 researchers.

About Avaya
Avaya enables the mission critical, real-time communication applications of the world’s most important operations. As the global leader in delivering superior communications experiences, Avaya provides the most complete portfolio of software and services for contact center and unified communications with integrated, secure networking— offered on premises, in the cloud, or a hybrid. Today’s digital world requires some form of communications enablement, and no other company is better positioned to do this than Avaya. For more information, please visit www.avaya.com.