Here we are back at base, having spent last week in Birmingham at the world’s best security show – probably the same as you (if not, why not?)
After a weekend just winding down – taming wild beasts, pulling a truck uphill with my teeth – we find ourselves asking the question:
Where will IFSEC 2009 fit into the great scheme of things?
Now, of course, there were some critical voices at the show. You know, “Not as busy as last year, smaller stands, blah blah…”
But just what, exactly, do some people expect?
Do they really need to be reminded that we are now right at the bottom (hopefully) of the worst recession in living memory.
Taking that little fact into account, you can’t help concluding that IFSEC 2009 was an amazing triumph, showing just how resilient and positive this industry really is in tough times.
Maybe the show was a little smaller than in the recent years of plenty, but it’s a bit like criticising Mother Teresa for not wearing a twin set with matching handbag.
Given the “current economic situation” (my apologies), wasn’t it a great relief that the show was so vibrant and packed with positive people launching new products and anticipating a return to business as usual in a relatively short time?
Count your blessings
Some people don’t know when they’re well off. Take practically any other industry – manufacturing or services – and you’d be hard pressed to find such enthusiasm and anticipation of a return to buoyant business.
At the moment some industries couldn’t stage a trade show in a tent off the M1. They’d have to pay exhibitors to attend and drag visitors in off the streets.
In comparison – an extremely important word when talking about the security industry Vs the rest – we are in a better position than practically any other industry sector.
Will our “motivational supply chain” (the criminal element) ever dry up? Course not. The nasty little rats, like the poor, will always be with us.
Will individual nations suddenly realise they have no enemies from within or without? Erm, not very likely. Is it?
It’s highly probable there will be an increasing need for security as the years roll by. Sad that this is, it means the business opportunities will be massive for the people who can take the blows on the chin in harder times and come up fighting when the opportunities really present themselves again.
Healthy optimism
Personally, I don’t have much time for the whingers who perpetuate their own circumstances. Times like these call for creative thought and a willingness to widen business horizons.
That’s not to say that a healthy realism is not welcome, and I think that Alun John, Norbain’s CEO once again (acknowledging a slight shift in his attitude since I interviewed him last year) showed a refreshing willingness to tell it like it is.
As the major CCTV distributor of both analogue and IP equipment, Norbain opinion would seem to come from a neutral or “agnostic” perspective. Read this latest assessment of the market and the IP revolution.
Another major mover in the industry, Vineet Nargolwala, EMEA MD of Honeywell Systems, used the phrase “cautious” to describe the climate, but he was upbeat about prospects.
“Two or three months ago there was a lot of doom and gloom and everybody expected a spate of bankruptcies and that’s not happened,” he told me.
New chairman of the BSIA’s access control section, Mike Sussman of TDSi, also echoed a more optimistic outlook in his sector and said that the foot traffic to his company’s stand was very similar to last year.
High on hybrid
Not surprisingly in the recession, with owners not overly eager to rip out all their legacy CCTV kit, almost every manufacturer was speaking of “hybrid” analogue/IP as the way forward – at least in the UK.
This is triumph for realism itself and far removed from the evangelical salesmanship we used to see from the IP sector a few years ago.
Click here to see Simon Nash of Sony, a major IP provider, elaborate on the company’s “Go Hybrid” campaign.
Dedicated Micros were even saying that hidden IP costs and network downtime were making some security managers so disillusioned that they were considering replacing their IP cameras with conventional analogue models.
But overall, the hybid message rang out.
At the Bosch press presentation I was so surprised the company had got through the business without once mentioning the word, that I asked UK MD Paul Wong if this was significant?
He answered that the hybrid concept was so fundamental that they didn’t feel the need to mention it!
Join the steering group
Naturally, I’m always listening out for ways that installers can generate business and increase their income.
Along these lines, one of the things that stood out at the show was one of the AD Group launches.
Jeff Berg, who has written a fair amount in Security Installer over the years, has now taken the reins – or should I say wheel – at AD Mobile.
He is firmly of the opinion that there is great scope for traditional security engineers in the area of mobile CCTV.
While installers have traditionally regarded the massive residential market as security’s “uncracked nut”, I could see how that title could also be applied to this newer sector.
Just think of all those buses trains, cabs, trucks, hire fleets and coaches out there that are just crying out for cameras.
And, while no-one wants to dwell on the effects of a recession as a business opportunity, it’s a fact that haulage companies are seeing an increase in attacks on high value goods, so this could be a potentially lucrative market for installers.
With AD’s TransVu system, the benefits to bus operators, such as internal onboard advertising, can make the system pay for itself.
Jeff says that buses now have, on average, twelve cameras on board, watching inside and out.
He says that conventional security installers make very good mobile CCTV installers – generally better than those from the automotive industry – so, even if you don’t follow up on AD’s training, this could be a valuable area to get involved in.
Mobile cameras also seem to have mystical power to heal in medical cases.
Amazingly, whiplash injury can clear-up overnight when a bus company can prove there was no undue swerving or braking, as claimed by the poor ‘injured’ passenger.
More balanced view
I was also interested to hear that Assa Abloy will soon be opening their new training Academy.
Director, Pat Jefferies explained to me how a simple door can produce vastly different reactions depending on whether you’re a locksmith or an access control installer.
The Academy promises to give each one of these disciplines more of a balanced view of things.
A tweet for followers
I’m not quite certain that the exhibitors we visited appreciated quite how multi-media’d the journalists from UBM Live (that’s us folks) had become.
We posted, we tweeted, we ‘Linked-In’ – chatting to an exhibitor on the stand and getting it up on to our info4security website with a picture or video within half an hour or so.
I’ve had at least two exhibitors email me since the show asking whether or not we will be reporting on their product or service.
Err, we probably posted it up that day, so if any UBM journos dropped in on you, have a look at our on-site coverage here.
Of course, a lot of the product launches and event reports will be going into the IFSEC special report I’m doing for the July edition of Security Installer magazine, so watch out for that.
We will remember them
I mentioned in my introduction how, as a veteran of fourteen IFSECs (arrrggh, I can’t believe it) where I thought this one would fit into the roll of honour.
Some traders might want to forget this year but I’d say it will be remembered for showing just how resilient this industry is.
Predictably, you remember past shows for the products launched rather than the events themselves… or sometimes the presenters and comedians at the IFSEC Awards (check out this year’s winners here).
Who could forget those great IFSEC moments – “The Spice-ish Girls” (god knows whose stand it was) during the height of ‘girl power’, Nookie Bear at the IFSEC Awards, the scantily clad ‘schoolgirls’ bringing all foot traffic to a halt around the Dennard stand, the CCTV camera that climbed up its own pole…
Ah glory days! This year, there were relatively few gimmicks, although Anthony Hildebrand, heartthrob editor of I4S spent a fair amount of time snapping a large number of young ladies for his cleverly titled ‘IFSEC’s Appeal’ (get it?).
Well, someone had to do it. See his glamour gallery here.
