In the summer of 2024, Airbus Public Safety and Security was awarded the contract for a new Push-To-Talk (PTT) communications solution for the operation of Road Traffic Management by Rijkswaterstaat, which is responsible for national highways, waterways and water systems in the Netherlands.

Agnet MCX, powered by Airbus, will be used as a back-up communications solution throughout and just beyond the Netherlands by road inspectors, who work on the entire main road network and in border areas, as well as operational advisory staff and road traffic controllers within Rijkswaterstaat. The Agnet solution uses the Vodafone network which provides nationwide coverage in the Netherlands including in tunnels on the highways. Furthermore, the solution will provide an emergency button functionality for employees in distress.

With Agnet MCX, Road Traffic Management employees at Rijkswaterstaat will thus start transitioning from narrowband (private mobile radios via a TETRA network) to broadband (PTT solution via the 4G nationwide Vodafone network) for critical communications purposes. 

Rijkswaterstaat and Airbus have started to use the Agnet MCX service which will be fully operational as of 2025 for the 1-to-1 replacement of the current radio communications solution. The devices used with Agnet are robust, professional smartphones that bring the needed hardware buttons for PTT and emergency on a very rugged smartphone. Further functionalities offered by Agnet will be explored and tested in 2025, and the deployment of the solution as a primary means of communications is foreseen in the next stage.