The very first meeting of the fire extinguishing section under the umbrella of Euralarm took place at the end of February in Brussels. Euralarm in its key roles is able offer a stronger position for the fire and security Industry as a whole when interacting with European stakeholders, and reflects the consolidation of these activities within the Industry and Euralarm’s membership.

“The biggest opportunity in bringing together fire extinguishing and detection within Euralarm is to strengthen our voice in the dialogue with EU Institutions by representing the entire Fire Industry,” stated Dominique Taudin, Senior Director, Codes & Standards, United Technologies.

This more unified representation for the fire and security Industry in Europe is also an answer to new challenges: from the revision of the EU Construction Product Regulation, to new development in EU legislations and European standards, as well as technological development which will impact the Industry across all segments.

Formed in late 2017, the creation of the new section has already been met with a strong support from the fire safety and security community. This was reflected in the large attendance of the kick-off meeting of the new Section, where CEO’s and senior representatives of major companies and national association influential within the sector were all represented.

The meeting was also the occasion to formally acknowledge the first five members of the section: national associations SikkerhedsBranchen representing the Danish Industry, the UK Fire Industry Association (FIA) and the Swiss Security Industry Association (SES), as well as Siemens and JCI/Tyco.

Discussions during the meeting touched a broad range of topics, from political influence to the development of statistics, the regulatory environment common to the whole Industry, standards at European and international (ISO) level and common work performed by Euralarm in this area. “Euralarm's competence in standardisation is of great benefit to the fire extinguishing Industry,” explained Gerd Hülsen, Head Global Application Engineering, Siemens and Siemens Delegate to the Extinguishing Section. “The development of European application guidelines is a cross-industry topic for both fire extinguishing and detection and probably also security,” added Michael Scharnowsky, Business Development International Alarm- & Security-Systems Division, Swiss Securitas Group.

Overall, it is the whole strategy of the fire extinguishing sector at European level which should be impacted by the creation of the new section under Euralarm. Industry representatives however strongly advocated to centre the strategy of Euralarm on increasing the safety and security of European citizens.

“Euralarm’s new Extinguishing Section should bring benefits relatively soon to this sector of our Industry. Members of the Industry should join the fire extinguishing section of Euralarm sooner than later if they want to influence and shape the future of the section and of the whole Industry” said Euralarm President Enzo Peduzzi.