New App to Alert First Responders to Emergencies.

• Author: Tadjdeh, Yasmin

During emergency situations, such as those involving active shooters, alerting authorities quickly can result in lives saved. One new app is helping to streamline that process.

Mutualink, a communication and multimedia company, has teamed up with Rave Mobile Safety, a public safety software company, to create a system that can, at the push of a button on a smartphone, alert authorities to emergency situations while connecting them to radio, video streams and building floor plans.

"What's important to recognize with our panic button application is that we are directly integrated into the 911 system," said Todd Miller, vice president of public safety services at Rave. "That means rather than simply notifying first responders and having them self dispatch, we're going to bring this information directly into our local 911 centers which is incredibly important especially when you're dealing with active shooter-type scenarios."

Time is of the essence in such circumstances, he said. Active shooters situations are often finished within five to six minutes, he added.

Rave's panic button is integrated with Mutualink's emergency communication infrastructure that has been in use for years, said Mark Hatten, CEO of Mutualink.

Prior to the partnership with Rave, one "weak link' in Mutualink's product was that its panic buttons were...