By Steven Sachoff, editor and educational sectors, is on the rise, Grossi said. projects such as border control and passport applica-
Despite the current economic downturn, the Eu- While the economic recession has definitely affected tions in a number of Western European countries such ropean biometrics market is expected to nearly the biometrics market, Grossi said large-scale deploy- as the UK, France, Germany, Spain and Sweden, as ex-triple in value from its 2008 level by 2012, fueled
ment in government projects and the amples of large-scale projects boost-
by rising security concerns and growing demand from
introduction of biometrics as a time ing the growth of this market.
both the public and private sectors, according to a report
and attendance tool and as a new While many of the current appli-
by the research and consultancy firm Frost & Sullivan.
standard feature in high-end applica- cations center around fingerprint-
“As the level of security breaches and transaction
tions have helped keep the market based technologies, the biometrics
fraud increases, the need for enhanced, secure identifi-
buoyant. “The biometrics market market will benefit from the fact
cation and personal verification technologies increases
witnessed a dip of 10 percent in that other technologies are begin-
proportionally,” said Frost & Sullivan analyst Matia
revenues in 2008, but the announce- ning to come into their own, such
Grossi.
ment of new large-scale projects to counterbalance the as face recognition, iris scans, hand geometry, vascular
According to Grossi, the government sector accounts
economic recession is expected to favorably impact the scans and retina scans. There are also a number of new
for just under 45 percent of the European biometrics
overall biometrics market,” he said. physiological technologies in the wings, including
market today, but development of biometrics products
Frost & Sullivan analyst Suja Chellathurai points to skinprints, earlobe scans, brain fingerprints and DNA
for commercial markets, the financial, healthcare, retail
the launch of recent government identity management recognition, even body odor recognition. SSNE
IMS lowers forecast for video, remains positive
robust after the past three months of a crossover to more IP camera revenue
watching the market. than analog camera revenue in 2012,
Will this mean a quicker transition roughly where Frost & Sullivan sees it.
to IP-based systems as people leverage One thing that makes Harris hesitant
their network infrastructure, as Frost & to sound analog’s death knell is that
Sullivan recently predicted, or will fewer “there’s still a huge market for low-end
installations and more price pressure systems, low camera counts, where
move the date of the crossover back? the low cost of cameras and DVRs still
“I think there’s merit in both argu- has some real advantages to it. It’s go-
ments,” said Simon Harris, senior re- ing to take a long time before IP can
search director at IMS. “We’re currently really compete at that low end of the
collecting data for 2009 and we should market.”
be able to figure out some real data on “It’s surprising how big that low end of
that question soon, rather than just the market is,” he continued. “There’s a
guessing. But my gut feeling is that it’s lot of small retailers out there. It’s a quite
not accelerating the move to IP. I haven’t chunky part of the market, and that’s re-
seen any evidence for that.” ally the mainstay of analog today.”
However, IMS is predicting, he said, Not surprisingly, he sees IP taking
By L. Samuel Pfeifle, contributing editor
WELLINGBOROUGH, U.K.—In consideration of the difficult months of December, January and February in the world markets, IMS Research has revised downward its predictions for the video surveillance market. Specifically, IMS predicts a small contraction in the analog video market for the Americas in 2009, though IP video sales are expected to grow at better than 25 percent.
Globally, IMS predicts three percent growth for analog and 29 percent growth for IP. However, those predictions represent $750 million less revenue than IMS predicted for 2009 back in November. IMS still sees growth, but the research firm’s predictions are 15 percent less
hold in larger applications, “where the real arguments for IP show more return, the total cost of ownership is less, the lower maintenance costs, those factors really pay dividends for the bigger systems.”
As other industries, and global economies, contract, what makes video surveillance so resilient? “I think surveillance’s importance has escalated,” said Harris. “It’s seen as a must-have now, rather than a nice-to-have. It’s critical to their business procedures that they have good security in place.”
Further, he said, “technology is evolving at a faster pace than it probably ever has before, whether it’s better compression with H.264, or much better image quality with megapixel cameras, the reasons to encourage users to upgrade their systems are really strong for 2009.” SSNE
Telcos to grow in video
surveillance market
By Daniel Gelinas, contributing associate editor
AJan. 15 release from IMS Research predicts the remote video monitoring and surveillance market will see rapid and substantial growth over the next four years, jumping from $158 million in 2008 to more than $478.3 million by 2013.
The term RVMaS refers to network camera-based solutions that allow the end user to remotely view live or recently recorded video in security and non-security related applications. How much of a threat to established security companies are telcos going to become as RVMaS grows? According to IMS Research Security & Fire Group analyst Gary Wong, “telcos, ISPs and mobile/ wireless operators could potentially threaten the established monitored secu-
rity market in the mid- to
Remote video monitoring and surveillance market
long-term.”
growth Wong said in order to
IMS Research
Growth in millions $US
mitigate the encroaching telco presence, traditional security companies will need to offer customers more innovative products and services. Wong points to a recently announced partnership between ADT and iControl (see related story
page 27) as an example.
SSNE
Frost & Sullivan makes bold
predictions for security, IP
retired from heading security efforts
By L. Samuel Pfeifle, contributing editor
CYBERSPACE—In a Webinar held March 12 for the press, Frost & Sullivan analyst Dilip Sarangan said economic recovery for the United States in 2009 is not a “far-fetched idea,” that network-based security technology will still grow at 15- 20 percent, and that the current economic climate will actually increase the speed at which IP-based technology is adopted by the security end user community.
for the city of Ottawa, said, “end users without IP technology products such as cameras will be hesitant to convert their hardware due to cost. Analog cameras that need to be replaced are not being replaced by IP cameras as quickly as anticipated by manufacturers due to budget restraints.”
“Here at Frost & Sullivan, we look at the crossover from analog to IP-based systems,” he said, “and the crossover was taking place beyond 2013, 2014, but with things moving in this economy, it seems like that crossover will actually take place sooner than expected, where more than 50 percent of the systems are network-based systems.”
This is contradictory to comments made by some other industry observers. Recently, John Monti, vice president of sales and marketing at chip maker Pixim, said, “I think the transition point for analog to IP might move out about two years” because of the economy. And Bob Gauvreau, an industry observer
However, others have made the argument that network-based systems leverage a common backbone that exists already in enterprises. “Given the significant and growing investments in IP technology overall,” said Bob Beliles, vice president of enterprise business development for Hirsch, “companies may look at IP-physi-cal security installations as a better use of a common resource that can yield improved capital cost structures and potentially improve operational benefits over the long term.”
Sarangan predicted that analog product sales would be flat to negative for 2009, while the industry as a whole grows at roughly five-to-six percent. Later, however, he said he was seeing reduced demand for security systems as a whole, especially for wireless and analytics technologies. SSNE
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