According to market research company Research and Markets, the global market for perimeter security will reach 29.6 billion dollars by 2025. This represents an annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.7 percent.
A changing market
Kettil Stenberg, CEO for Stanley Security in the Nordics, believes that the market for perimeter security has changed a lot in recent years.
“We have moved more and more towards high technology solutions, radar has developed a lot as well as video surveillance”, he says.
Kettil Stenberg also points out that video analytics has been used for a long time for perimeter security, but previously there were major problems with false alarms. In recent times, there have been new developments in video analytics and accuracy has improved significantly.
”Having said that, you do not want to take 100 per cent of false alarms away because then you risk taking away some of the real ones too”, he says.
Jimmy Ek, Nordic Sales Manager at Axis Communications, stresses that a larger variety of products and sensors for perimeter security are being integrated today. Radar, thermal cameras, laser detectors and drones in collaboration with security guards are some examples. And there is more focus on solutions rather than on individual products.
Higher quality and lower price
Mark Cosgrave, Division Manager for Western Europe at Optex, also believes the market has changed, and that goes both for the sensors and end user requirements.
He says: “They want reliability, they want to protect what they have and that we can provide”.
Nicolas Jdanoff, Business Development Manager for Europe and Northern Africa at the Italian perimeter security manufacturer Cias, stresses that IP solutions is a must have and that everything needs to be completely integrated with third party systems like video management systems.
”The market is always calling for higher quality, sometimes at lower prices, which is a paradox. We are trying to bring detection performance and lower the rate of false alarms by improving the quality of the algorithms,” he says.
Björn Bäck, Pre-Sales Engineer at Hikvision, thinks that the biggest changes in the market are that the price has decreased and the technology is more accessible and the security cameras are so efficient now that they are good solutions both during day and night and also during winter time without creating false alarms.
Johan Elliott, Business Development Manager at Bosch Building Technologies, says that high quality video analytics is dominating the market and that the customers have more confidence in it than in more traditional perimeter security technology such as fence alarms.
The customers and the demand
Jimmy Ek thinks that industry applications, factories and logistic centres are the three most common examples of businesses that require perimeter security.
“But then there is perimeter without any hard fence, like schools for example”, he says.
High security facilities such as power stations and other critical infrastructure, as well as airports, military bases and prisons are some other examples where perimeter security is important. Often, it is about monitoring the outer perimeter. Public transport with train stations and metro is another example, where it is about detecting whether someone enters the train tracks or gets pushed down on to a track.
But there can be a great variation in customers and applications for perimeter security. Imagine an airport: it has many different types of areas that require different levels of security. Everything from car parks outside the airport, to runways and areas where unauthorised people should definitely not have access, to the terminals themselves which more or less function as shopping centres.
”What customers demand in the first place is reliability. Early warning is the other thing as well. It is desirable to detect somebody when they are on the outside, of course, that is what people really want”, says Mark Cosgrave from Optex.
Early detection is crucial
Björn Bäck from Hikvision believes that customers primarily demand efficient technology that detects and reports what is happening. Johan Elliott believes that a typical customer, such as a logistics centre, often has problems with intruders trying to steal things at night.
“Customers want to detect people that come close to the fence, they want to see them, and they want to receive an alarm”, he says. Early detection is very important since it makes it possible to react before an intrusion takes place and thus completely avoid any damage.
Jimmy Ek says: “End customers want to keep people outside the premises, they want to control who is coming in. Perimeter is important for many companies. They understand how much value is at risk if someone breaks in and steals things or causes a downtime.”
Global
