Terrestrial Trunked Radio (TETRA) is a digital trunked mobile radio standard developed by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI). The purpose of the TETRA standard was to meet the needs of traditional Professional Mobile Radio (PMR) user organisations such as those listed below. The air interfaces, network interfaces as well as the services and facilities are specified in sufficient detail to enable independent manufacturers develop infrastructure and radio terminal products that would fully inter-operate with each other. For example, radio terminals from different manufacturers can operate on infrastructures from other manufacturers. The ability for full interoperability between different manufacturer’s products is a distinct advantage of open standards developed by ETSI. As the TETRA standard is supported by several independent manufacturers this increases competition, provides second source security and allows a greater choice of terminal products for specific user applications.

PMR Organizations Include:

• Public Safety
• Transportation
• Utilities
• Government
• Military
• PAMR
• Commercial & Industry
• Oil & Gas

Because the TETRA standard has been specifically developed to meet the needs of a wide variety of traditional PMR user organisations it has a scaleable architecture allowing economic network deployments ranging from single site local area coverage to multiple site wide area national coverage.   Besides meeting the needs of traditional PMR user organisations, the TETRA standard has also been developed to meet the needs of Public Access Mobile Radio (PAMR) operators. The TETRA standard is in practice, a suite of standards covering different technology aspects, for example, air interfaces, network interfaces and its services and facilities. Because TETRA is an evolving standard it has been developed in Releases (phases) known as TETRA Release 1 and TETRA Release 2. Even though both TETRA Releases have been completed, work continues within ETSI Technical Committee (TC) TETRA to further enhance the standard thus satisfying new user requirements as well as gleaning the benefits of new technology innovations. Outside of Europe the ETSI TETRA Standard has been formerly adopted in China and South Korea.

Since the first generation of networks were deployed in 1997, hundreds of TETRA networks have been deployed across the world.  Even though a considerable number of these networks are deployed in Europe, a rapid uptake is occurring in the regions of Asia, Middle East and South America.  Although all PMR market segments are already being served by TETRA, the largest market is that of public safety, where the trend is for the deployment of nationwide networks shared by all public safety organisations for reasons of economics (sharing), autonomy of operation for routine communications and the ability to fully inter-operate with other services during emergency situations and disasters.

The transportation market is the next fastest growing market, especially for Mass Rapid Transport systems and major Airports.  Interestingly, TETRA is also used by the military for non-tactical operations, a market application not originally anticipated for TETRA. The success and market uptake of TETRA has attracted many independent manufacturers and suppliers of TETRA products and services, thereby providing users with healthy competition, second source security and wide choice of radio terminal equipment for specific applications. The success of TETRA has also created a strong base of application developers who are able to provide a wide variety of applications for use with TETRA.

The TETRA Association
Recognizing that important market requirements outside the responsibility of ETSI needed to be addressed to ensure the success of TETRA, a number of organisations formed the TETRA MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) Association in December 1994.  Since it has been established, the TETRA Association has grown significantly and now provides a forum which acts on behalf of its members, being user organisations, manufacturers, application providers, integrators, operators, test houses, regulators, consultants, etc. The main objectives of the TETRA Association are to promote the TETRA standard and to ensure multi-vendor equipment interoperability. (source www.tetra-association.com)

India is likely to leap-frog from being the twelfth largest consumer market in the world to become the fifth largest, reported by a recent McKinsey study. Aggregate Indian consumer spending is estimated to more than quadruple to US$ 1.77 trillion by 2025. The WiMAX ecosystem in India is expected to increase from 500 million in 2010 to 650 million in 2011 for Macro & Microbase Transceiver Stations (Tss). The enterprise mobility market is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of 14.5% by 2012-13, with expected revenues of $250 million from India by 2009. The Indian economy has been growing at an average rate of 8.8 percent per annum, with 2006-07 growth rate of 9.6 percent being the highest in the last 18 years. The total market for semiconductors in India (including imports), grew to $2.82 billion in 2005 and is expected to reach $12.67 billion in 2010 and further grow to $36.30 billion in 2015, growing at a CAGR of 29.8 percent, according to ISA-Frost & Sullivan.

Wireless Segments in India Include: High speed mobile broadband, Wireless connectivity, Fixed Mobile Convergence, Seamless and secure integration of mobile and IP, Telematics, Unified Communications, Field services, RFID and tracking, Mobile data capture, Storage, Supply chain and Logistics, Mobile Location Services, Devices & Applications, Enterprise Wireless Infrastructure, Middleware and Platforms

Indian Wireless Technologies Include: 3G and NGNs, WiFi, WiMAX, WLAN, WVoIP, RFID, GPS, NFC, Bluetooth, UMTS, GSM, GPRS, TETRA, CDPD

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