Research Snapshot: Fire Fighting

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In addition to our analytical marketing skills, clients also value the ability to see and interpret for themselves the unfiltered comments discovered during research efforts with both existing and potential customers. Product developers and engineering managers often find new insights – little nuggets of qualitative gold – in our reports.

​Here’s one example from the more than 250 projects we’ve done in technical B2B markets.
Fire department chief on new developments in 2002 related to fire incident command & accountability software. (Context: phone interview)
His department is “currently working with a number of different companies to develop a completely integrated incident command and accountability package. Motorola received a federal grant to develop an electronic accountability system for firefighting, so we’re working with them. But there’s other companies involved, too.”

Key players and the roles they are playing in this effort include:

Motorola – “developing mobile data terminals, a wireless system, and experimenting with TX messenger system for communications. They’re also evaluating various types of sensors that would be placed on firefighters in order to keep track of them.” (Similar to a transponder.)

Field Soft of Chandler, Arizona  and Group One – “Those are software developers who are working on an integrated package that will take an address generated by the computer-aided dispatching ticket, then access the fire records database for the address, routing maps, floor plans, and information on neighboring hazardous buildings. The idea is to quickly access historical information from fire occupancy inspections and have all that information available to whoever’s in command at the fire scene.”