Avwatch awarded civilian license for goverment developed Android Team Awareness App

PLYMOUTH, Mass. - Nov. 4, 2015 - PRLog -- Avwatch, Inc. (Avwatch) has been awarded a civilian license for the business use of a high-tech app, developed by  the military, for applications that include first responder, emergency management and environmental protection.

Developed by the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) in Rome, New York, the Android Team Awareness Kit (ATAK™) is an Android situational awareness application originally designed for U.S. Special Operations Forces. The application, which runs on Android cell phones and tablets as well as in a Chrome browser, provides the ability to securely share live video, position information, text chat, photos, KML and other geospatial collaborative information on an interactive, moving map.

Avwatch is among the first private enterprises granted the right to use this app. The civilian version of the app is known as TAK-C. It was created to meet the needs of Federal, state, local and non-government law enforcement, emergency response, and other public safety organizations. The Android application delivers real-time situational awareness across all levels of an organization from senior leaders to supervisors and responders in the field. TAK-C provides decision makers with critical information in real-time, enabling them to make better decisions, increase operational effectiveness and improve response times and enhance responder safety.

TAK-C will benefit a wide variety of organizations such as first responders, emergency management, environmental protection, and non-profit organizations supporting public safety. TAK-C has been proven effective in incident management, site surveying, multi-agency collaboration, unmanned systems operations, environmental assessments, and special event coordination in numerous domains.

Avwatch has specifically used TAK-C in support of numerous operations across public and private sectors nationwide, including response coordination during the 2015 Boston Marathon, tracking vessels and boom deployment for an oil spill exercise in Buzzards Bay, streaming real-time video for border security initiatives, and sharing location information of firefighters during wildfire responses.

When speaking of TAK-C and its capabilities, Chris Kluckhuhn, Founder and CEO of Avwatch, said “TAK-C incorporates more than a decade of lessons learned from operations overseas, hurricanes, oil spills, wild fire responses, and day to day operational requirements into a simple application that provides responders in the field the same level of situational awareness in the palm of their hand that traditionally only exists in a fully operational command center.”  The application provides a team of teams approach which provides a secure framework to bridge multiple stakeholders into a unified operating environment.

Avwatch will offer secure annual subscriptions to customers’ private or federated TAK-C networks. In addition, Avwatch will offer TAK-C training at the customer’s location or at Avwatch’s state-of-the-art facility in Plymouth, Massachusetts. For further information please contact tak-c@avwatch.us.

About Avwatch

Avwatch is a Service-Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business (SDVOSB), which harnesses innovative and proven technologies to support, enhance, and train Federal, state and local government agencies in support of homeland security and disaster recovery. The company’s unique airborne platform permits homeland security professionals the freedom to interact directly with aircraft, generate requested flight routes, specify data to be collected and precisely control the onboard camera sensors. Communications between the ground user and aircraft are internet-provided, allowing the user and aircraft to communicate in real time.  This facilitates immediate aircraft tasking and retrieval of data and imagery updates from anywhere in the world, at any time.

The company was founded in 2008 and is comprised of nationally recognized Homeland Security experts who are well-versed in military, federal, state and local disaster response planning and response protocols. Avwatch technology has been used to assist in oil cleanup following the 2010 explosion on BP’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, where they provided high-quality streaming video to the US Coast Guard, BP and authorities to assist with oil spill cleanup. Avwatch provides homeland security professionals and corporations with low-cost solutions that improve interoperability, robustness, and situational awareness. The company also provides training for US Air Force Pilots prior to overseas deployment, and has been instrumental in rescues during extreme weather conditions, including hurricanes. In addition to firefighting, the technology is also used by law enforcement to improve first responders’ situational awareness. Avwatch maintains headquarters at 246 South Meadow Road, Plymouth, MA and serves a national client base. For additional information, please visit www.avwatch.us or call 774-247-0001.