PSIJan2017

SECURITY IN 2017
The industry year ahead
The unknown, but
hoped for, expectant
promise of the next
twelve months is
something that has
captured the
imagination of the
public and business
for a long time and
the security industry
is no different
The New Year is upon us so what
can we expect to see over the next
twelve months? Here are the PSI
predictions for 2017 (and maybe a
little into 2018…)
At this time of year, when the weather is
getting colder and we get the fairly recent
and unnecessary distraction of Black Friday
behind us, we start looking ahead to the festive
break, presents, parties and the year ahead. The
unknown, but hoped for, expectant promise of the
next twelve months is something that has
captured the imagination of the public and
business for a long time and the security industry
is no different. Therefore we thought it might be
interesting to do PSI’s New Year predictions with
more found elsewhere in this edition in the Panel
feature.
Let’s get one thing straight before we start -
the industry will definitely see some big events in
2017.
Just think where we were this time last year.
Looking back I recall predicting that we would see
more consolidation in 2016 following the antics of
Canon in 2015 when they bought up Milestone
and Axis and also the acquisition of the Siemens
security arm by Vanderbilt, the news that Hanwha
had splashed the cash for Samsung Techwin and
also Honeywell getting in on the act with the
Xtralis deal. Those stories shook the market up
and we all thought that these companies might
look for more new channels and further buys in
2016. We were wrong on the buyers but not the
dealings as it was one of the massive Chinese
surveillance companies that bought big in 2016 as
Hikvision acquired Pyronix. Not to say that the
previously mentioned companies sat idle in the
market as lots of new partnerships and sales
agreements were confirmed, but the attentiongrabbing
buy was by Hikvision who also outgrew
their HQ in 2016 moving to new premises this
year.
The dominance of the relatively new camera
manufacturer and its business dealings this year
are keeping the rumour mills in full flow at the
moment with thoughts abound on what main
competitior Dahua will do as a result of the
addition of an intruder business to the Hikvision
portfolio. No doubt in 2017 we will find out
whether they try to match their rival or blow them
out of the water via acquisition.
In all likelihood there are only a couple of
directions that Dahua, and Hikvision, can further
grow their businesses. Adding an intruder arm is
one such direction and to that you would have to
add a Video Management Software (VMS)
company (such as the aforementioned Milestone)
an access control leader and a fire
detection/prevention division. You might argue
that a company offering analytics expertise could
go on the list, but both companies have some
feature rich cameras already onboard, so will not
(in my opinion) look at this direction as a
necessary step just now.
Of course one of the other trends for 2017 is
analytics (for the nth year on the trot...) but I don’t
see an analytics software house being a major
target for either company as they strive to claim UK
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