Vocera announces a shareable, Wi-Fi-only handset

It may share a name with James Cameron's classic cyborg villain, but Vocera's new T1000 Wi-Fi phone system has more in common with communicators of the Gene Roddenberry variety.

Vocera's system of wireless handsets and communicator badges is built upon a Windows server and integrated with both the PBX phone system and the patient monitoring/supply management/point of sale systems. The server handles the call management, user profiles, and speech recognition commands. Devices are interchangeably assigned to a user profile and phone number, making them instantly re-assignable when shifts change.

To make calls, the user simply connects to the in-house WLAN, where he can make PTT calls to other users on the system, place outgoing calls through the public phone network, or make broadcasts to chosen contacts.

The T1000 is 2" x 4.5" x .7", and offers about 4 hours of talktime or 60 hours of standby. Designed for healthcare environments, its outer surface has an anti-microbial agent that keeps the phone a little cleaner for its users.

Vocera expects the handset to be available in Q4 of 2008.