Biamp’s Vocia Earns European Approval
This week at InfoComm 2010, Biamp Systems announced that its Vocia notification system has earned EN 54-16 accreditation, a qualification that brings the Vocia system recognition of adhering to one of the most stringent voice evacuation and fire alarm standards in the world.
This week at InfoComm 2010, Biamp Systems announced that its Vocia notification system has earned EN 54-16 accreditation, a qualification that brings the Vocia system recognition of adhering to one of the most stringent voice evacuation and fire alarm standards in the world.
EN 54-16 is a European standard that must be met by emergency notification systems. Biamp officials told PRO AV the certification was a year in the making and the company is now focused on adhering to the new NFPA 72 National Fire Alarm and Signaling Code.
Biamp’s Vocia is a paging and mass notification system that delivers scalability, flexibility, and intelligibility required to meet the global life safety standards and requirements, according to the company. Introduced earlier this year, Vocia was built from the ground up as a networked, decentralized, system with no single point of failure.
“When Biamp considered entering the life safety market, we knew compliance with the European Union’s life safety codes would be necessary to meet the requirements of buildings of the future,” said Graeme Harrison, vice president of international sales for Biamp Systems, in a statement. “Coupled with our internal research, as well as today’s market demand for Vocia, we knew Vocia would be flexible enough to fit any project requirements. Vocia’s decentralized, networked approach to voice evacuation makes it a solution for university campuses, transportation facilities, and other venues.”
Biamp says its new Control Interface (CI-1) device helped pave the way for Vocia earning the EN 54-16 voice evacuation safety standard approval. The CI-1 works with the Life Safety Interface (LSI-16), an emergency interface between the Vocia critical paging system and emergency and fire alarm systems.
In addition, this week at InfoComm Biamp announced Vocia is now available with new features that simplify the installation and maintenance process for systems integrators and end users. With the Vocia CobraNet Bridge software feature, Vocia can now communicate with Audia, as well as with any CobraNet device that use explicit bundle numbers. This feature expands the versatility and flexibility of Vocia by allowing IT professionals to layer Vocia on top of an existing Audia box or any CobraNet device without having to leverage separate network resources, according to the company. This has the potential to reduce costs associated with labor and installation and does not require systems integrators to lay new network cable or fiber optics, making installation easier and more cost-effective.
