Motorola to equip French Police with body-worn cameras

The French Ministry of the Interior has announced that it will deploy 30,000 of Motorola Solutions’ VB400 body-worn cameras to its National Police and the Gendarmerie (military police) to modernise policing. The $17.5 million rollout of body-worn cameras is expected to start in July 2021. The deployment will support the French government’s goal to improve trust and safety in policing by having all law enforcement officers wearing body-worn cameras.

Jack Molloy, Executive Vice President (Product and Worldwide Sales) at Motorola, noted that video technology will play a significant role in maintaining safety and integrity in all interactions between police and the community.

“After a rigorous testing and competitive process, our solutions ranked superior in performance, usability and the ability to seamlessly integrate into the workflows of France’s frontline police. We are proud to be their chosen partner and are committed to ongoing innovation with the French government,” Molloy said.

The VB400 is designed to protect the police and the public with its intuitive recording function and extended battery life that lasts beyond the shift with up to 12 hours of recording. Motorola Solutions will also provide a range of accessories including helmet cameras for motorcycle officers to capture high-definition footage when riding at high speed.

The cameras will be deployed with VideoManager evidence management software, which is essential to improving efficiency as video increasingly becomes part of an agency’s workflow. The cameras will upload recorded video directly into VideoManager, where it is securely stored in-country and organised using time, date and location, together with incident data added by officers.

“This partnership follows a number of significant body-worn camera deployments. Since moving into the body-worn camera market, we have quickly become a global leader due to our differentiated solution that integrates into our mission-critical ecosystem spanning voice communications, command centre software, and video security and analytics,” Molloy said.

The body-worm cameras are the latest in a series of global body-worn camera deployments within enterprises and law enforcement agencies. Additional deployments include Co-op in the UK, as well as Metro Nashville Police, Romania National Police and London Ambulance Services.

Future innovations could include Holster Aware, which automatically activates a recording and live streams body-worn camera footage if an officer draws his or her weapon, as well as an Android-compatible application that enables officers to view and categorise footage in the field.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Fractal Pictures