Mission-Critical Connectivity: SW Ambulance Service Headquarters

The South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SWASFT) is a critical pillar of the region’s emergency infrastructure, responsible for providing round-the-clock urgent care across 10,000 square miles—covering 20% of mainland England. From the rural reaches of Cornwall to the bustling urban centres of Bristol and Exeter, the Trust serves a resident population of over 5.5 million people, a figure that swells to 23 million during peak tourism seasons.

Operating from their headquarters in Exeter, SWASFT manages over one million incidents annually, making their administrative and training hubs vital for the coordination of life-saving services and the ongoing development of their 6,000-strong workforce.

Moving into a new building on its headquarters site in Exeter, it required a flagship AV solution for its primary conference space. As the largest meeting room in the region, the brief was demanding: it had to function as a high-end boardroom for Trust executives, a flexible training suite for staff, and a seamless hybrid hub for Microsoft Teams calls. With a constant rotation of different users from across the Trust, the system didn’t just need to be powerful—it had to be foolproof. Rather than them taking the 999 call, they put out an SOS to API to request a quotation for a full conference and meeting space solution.

Working with a high-profile emergency service in a newly renovated space brought a level of pressure to the project. We are lucky to work with a range of suppliers and manufacturers, giving access to some of best equipment on the market. For a space as critical for reliability and performance, it was crucial we selected brands that we knew were up to the demands, as well as using suppliers we have a close relationship with, so that support is readily available should we hit any snags with the project.

Our Solution:

As the main focus of the room was the Microsoft Teams system, we turned to a Yealink Teams room system, as the Ambulance service use the same brand equipment in their smaller meeting rooms, and familiarity is a great way to make sure everyone was comfortable operating the equipment. This had a touchscreen interface that was placed on a table at the front of the room, and allowed for a call to be started at the touch of a button, with the two PTZOptics cameras and Audio-Technica beamforming microphone all linked in to the PC this screen controls. It also gave the users a way to share their screen during or outside a video call, with a USB-C input on the touchscreen allowing for instant screen sharing without the need for any setup.

Four Audio-Technica digital wireless microphones were provided to give versatility for presentations and training, where multiple people may be involved in demonstrations, and questions will be taken from people participating. Using a digital wireless system was important, as it ensuring confidentiality through the encrypted transmission, and also ensured that the microphones would not be affected by the high number of radio signals used across the base for communication.

To give flexibility to the visual system, a Hisense portable interactive screen was provided to be used as the main display during presentations and calls, but could also be moved around the room and used as an independent display when required for smaller, ad-hoc meetings.

Control of the system was through a custom control interface, designed by us and running on an iPad, which could be used anywhere in the space. This gave control of the wireless microphone volumes, camera presets, but importantly, allowed a single-button setup of the room for either presentations or Teams calls, which sent commands to the equipment in the room to switch the screens to the correct input, turn on the relevant microphones and change the routing of the speakers.

*The nerdy bit*

The Audio-technica beamforming microphone has a total of 27 microphone capsules, which allows it to plot audio in 3D. Therefore, we were able to connect the microphone to one of the two PTZ cameras to allow us to ‘track’ speakers in real time, prompting the cameras to automatically pan and zoom to the person talking—creating a broadcast-quality experience for remote participants. This was a challenge to get right initially, as the microphone was clever enough to give height information as well as direction, so we had to get the settings and locations of the cameras right so that this worked smoothly.