Handheld PCs bags West Yorkshire Police deal

Cracking the case: West Yorkshire Police claims Handheld PCs' software will save vital minutes

Mobility specialist Handheld PCs is celebrating winning a deal with West Yorkshire Police to provide 3,500 officers with its hand-e-pix software.

The Slough-based firm will deploy the image capture software on the force's fleet of BlackBerrys. West Yorkshire Police will use hand-e-pix to gather crime scene evidence. Officers will be able to share photos which are stamped with time, date and geographical location information.

West Yorkshire has the fourth largest police force in England and Wales, serving more than two million people over a 780 square mile area. The force's mobile data manager Phil Short claimed the Handheld PCs software could help save crucial crime-solving minutes.

“We had such great feedback from the first 500 officers issued with hand-e-pix that it soon became clear that the entire force would benefit from the system," he said.

"We find that officers do not need to return to the police station to book out a digital camera or wait for a specialist scenes-of-crime officer (SOCO) unit to attend a scene in order to take a picture. This is invaluable in situations where evidence has a short life.”

Pierre Lams, director of Handheld PCs, added: “We have been convinced for some time that the UK police forces would benefit from using hand-e-pix. Handheld PCs is delighted that West Yorkshire Police is one of the first forces to adopt the system.

"We believe that the ability to capture and share multimedia from mobile devices, such as the BlackBerry, will continue to drive significant benefits in the public sector.”

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• Public Sector
• Mobility
• Software