Video surveillance industry outlook

Outlook on city surveillance level solutions:
The Prime Minister’s Clarion call for Digital India and Implementation of smart cities with a view to enhance safety & security especially Women Safety and automate /digitise day to operations to end red tape and corruption has resulted in a huge demand for Intelligent CCTV surveillance systems across the country be it Public buildings or Private institutions.

The concerned Ministries have empowered themselves with the general technical features of the systems involved and are demanding higher and higher differentiated outputs from these systems. It is not enough to provide state of Art systems loaded with pseudo features which never see actual usage. We believe that a harmonised solution backed by a powerful command and control centre both in terms of hardware and software is key to effectively realise the true objectives of surveillance.

Our focus:
Getting the fundamentals of imaging and data transmission right is most important for a system that basically has image and data as its only inputs.Since Inception our focus has always been getting the best solution at best price to the user. However, with the entry of so many OEMs into the industry (quite a few of them dubious and fly by night operators) over the last decade and a plethora of marketing claims floating around, the market has observed an increase in the level of dissatisfied consumers who had certain expectations from a system, which they eventually find to be limited or ineffective.

Analytics:
The reliance on analytics is often over stated. A good system has a harmonious and realistic mix of technology and people who can make the best use of the technology. We aim to deliver the best tools in every aspect be it City surveillance, Vehicle surveillance and tracking, ANPR and traffic management solutions and a cutting edge command and control center to integrate all of them.

Compressions:
Compression technologies play a vital role in determining networking and storage budgets. An increasing number of tendering authorities and consultants are mandating on Bit rate limitation technologies that provide significant savings in high resolution footages and at the same time not compromising on the quality of the content..

End to end solutions:
We have observed that most, if not all OEMs do not have complete end to end solutions at the right price point.Each one has their own specialties for different categories of products. We intend to optimally bundle the various specialities and make them talk to each other on a common platform, thereby delivering the optimum output to the end user. Proprietary features need to be integrated between OEMs when it comes to the public sector for the greater good.

Tendering:
Tendering authorities need to prescribe solution level evaluation as opposed to datasheet level evaluation. The authorities need to insist on proof of concept as a part of the evaluation and evaluate bids with appropriate weightage to technical strengths of the solution and the bidder. This method has been adopted by quite a few public and private institutions resulting in a better bidder implementing a superior solution.

Outlook on Smaller scale solutions:
With respect to smaller scale surveillance for homes and offices, there is an increasing demand for easy to install solutions.A noteworthy development is the acceptance of reliable wireless IP CCTV kits that address a growing niche of quick and immediate installation customers.What seems to be a strong selling point is the negligible cabling and labour involved as well as connectivity right from opening the box without manual intervention or setup. Longer distance (Relative) wireless say up to 800 meters in open spaces and say up to 30 meters with 3 walls in between are the key contributing features apart from ultra-wide angle and fisheye variants. We expect this segment to see exponential growth as the niche may turn into a pervasive trend in the small installations segment.

AHD or HD analog technologies hold the largest portion of the market and entry of 4mp solutions in AHD will make things interesting in the AHD vs IP battle for this segment. With IP becoming more and more affordable in the form of Kits and wireless solutions an equilibrium may soon be established on the net cost of ownership of AHD vs IP.

Challenges that threaten digitised systems:
A digitised system offers many possibilities and with that it often creates confusion among those who cannot fully understand the various protocols and security features and thus opens the system to intrusion. Currently, it’s a general trend of installers to leave security features untouched or as simplistic and non-restrictive as possible to avoid complications during setup and installation. This is a field day for most amateur hackers. Having an understanding of digital security features is of prime importance for a security systems integrator.

The rate at which the industry spreads the awareness about IT security needs to be faster than the rate at which hackers learn of vulnerabilities. We expect this to be a much larger struggle in the coming years with the newer generation having a much better digital literacy. Manufacturers, especially those from China, need to deliver products that are genuinely secure.

For more information,
Website: www.lookmansecurity.com