Baldvin Gislason Bern

ONVIF, global standardisation initiative for IP-based physical security products held its annual membership meeting in early November this year, with an overview of important activities of 2018 and perspective on the year ahead. Attendees heard presentations on the final release of Profile T in 2018, an advancement which represents how ONVIF keeps pace with technological advancements that affect product development and interoperability between IP-based physical security products. Profile T for advanced video streaming In an acknowledgement of its 10th anniversary, ONVIF chairman, Per Björkdahl highlighted the forum’s achievements over the past decade, including an overview of the six ONVIF profiles, with emphasis on the newly released Profile T for advanced video streaming. Collectively, the profiles provide support for the more than 10,000 conformant products that are increasingly included in various bid and specification processes in projects around the world. Björkdahl also cited the continued involvement of ONVIF as part of the work of the International Electrotechnical Commission’s TC79 for international standardisation. ONVIF also recognised the contributions of four individuals from various ONVIF technical committees for their work on different profiles and committees. Fredrik Svensson of Axis and Dora Han of Hikvision were recipients of the ONVIF award, which acknowledges individuals and companies who have made significant contributions to ONVIF. As chairman of the Profile T Working Group, Svensson was a leading force in the development and successful final release of the Profile T specification. Han received the award for her extensions to the specification, and for supporting the development of other members’ extensions to the specification. 2018 ONVIF Distinguished Service Awards recipients One of two 2018 ONVIF Distinguished Service Awards was given to Baldvin Gislason Bern of Axis  One of two 2018 ONVIF Distinguished Service Awards was given to Baldvin Gislason Bern of Axis for his role in developing and proofing the evolution concept as chair of the Technical Services Device Test Tool Evolution. Joining him in receiving this award is Dr. Hasan Timucin Ozdemir of Panasonic, who served as chairman from 2009-2018 of the ONVIF Video Enhancement Working Group, which is responsible for formulating and prototyping new features for the ONVIF specification. “All of our honorees have shown their significant and long-term commitment to the organisation as a whole, and in turn have directly and positively impacted the work of ONVIF,” said Björkdahl. “The success of our organisation would not be possible without the innovative contributions and hard work of our members, and for that, we say thank you.” Defining video surveillance and access control standards ONVIF Technical Committee Chairman, Hans Busch of Bosch, spoke to members about the specification development roadmap and its alignment to the standardisation activities within the IEC TC 79 working groups for video surveillance and physical access control standards. Technical Services Committee (TSC) Chair Andreas Schneider of Sony gave an overview of the committee’s work on new and existing profiles, client and device test tools, updates to the conformance process and tools and Developers’ Plugfests. Founding members Axis, Bosch and Sony automatically retain seats on the Steering, Technical and Technical Services CommitteesONVIF Communication Committee Chair, Tim Shen of Dahua provided a recap of ONVIF communication efforts in 2018, with a continued focus on market education about the specific profiles through presence at industry events and media activity. He also reported on the success of the first ever ONVIF Open Source Spotlight Challenge that took place earlier this year. The results of the annual elections for committees of ONVIF were announced by Kevin Schader, ONVIF Executive Director. Re-elected to the ONVIF Steering Committee were Mayur Salgar of Honeywell and Stuart Rawling of Pelco by Schneider Electric. For the Technical Committee, Hanwha Techwin’s Sujith Raman, Pelco by Schneider Electric’s Steve Wolf, and Tyco Security Product’s Stephen Serplus were re-elected, while Hikvision’s Dora Han joined the committee as a new member. Bob Dolan of Anixter and Giri Guntipalli of Honeywell were re-elected to the Technical Services Committee, along with new member Marwan Obeidat of Pelco by Schneider Electric. Tim Shen of Dahua, Jens Berthelsen of Hikvision and Xinming Kang of Honeywell were re-elected to the ONVIF Communication Committee, while Cathy Zhou of Huawei joined the committee as a new member. Founding members Axis, Bosch and Sony automatically retain seats on the Steering, Technical and Technical Services Committees. IP-based physical security solutions expert Founded in 2008, ONVIF is a leading and well-recognised industry forum driving interoperability for IP-based physical security products. The organisation has a global member base of established camera, video management system and access control companies and more than 10,000 profile conformant products. ONVIF offers Profile S for streaming video; Profile G for recording and storage; Profile C for physical access control; Profile Q for improved out-of-the-box functionality, Profile A for broader access control configuration and Profile T for advanced streaming. ONVIF continues to work with its members to expand the number of IP interoperability solutions that ONVIF conformant products can provide.

The access control industry is now picking up the challenge of embracing new technologies The access control business has, over the last 10 years, completely changed its image from being a rather unattractive slow growth and conservative business to taking up a position as a fast-growing confident business. The access control industry has listened and acted on the needs of the stakeholders in the supply chain and as a result the world market for access control products and software reached $6.83 billion in 2016, an increase of 10% on 2015. High growth rate For the last two years, access control has achieved a much higher rate of growth than either of the other two sectors and it looks like it will retain this status in 2017. We forecast that it will grow by a CAGR of 11.23% to 2021 making sales of $11.56 billion in that year. These levels of growth will be driven by ACaaS, biometric readers and identity management, wireless locking systems and more penetration of IP network systems. It is still a much smaller business than video surveillance and this will always be the case, but it now has the confidence to move forward and pick up the challenge of embracing new technologies, which is driving up demand. The future looks bright, as some major technological and commercial changes in this sector will continue to drive growth at these higher levels. Maintaining growth momentum We feel more bullish about this business as it moves into IP networking and strengthens its relationship with biometrics and identity management. These trends are significant drivers that should maintain the growth momentum that has built up over the last two years. However, it is possible that some access control manufacturers will become complacent and hold back from becoming open. On March 4, 2014, ONVIF announced the final release of Profile C, which brings the functionality of the ONVIF global interface specification into the physical access control arena. The access control business is strengthening its relationship with biometrics and identity management ONVIF has been successfully introduced into the video surveillance industry. Baldvin Gislason Bern, Chairman of ONVIF’s Profile C Working Group, said “Integration between IP-based physical access control systems and video surveillance is no longer considered a luxury in today’s market, and is becoming a necessary component for many different types of users. With Profile C, users and specifiers will be able to integrate the Profile C products of their choosing without relying on existing integrations between manufacturers.” Combination of IP and open systems What concerns many access control manufacturers is that as the market gradually becomes open and more competitive, their heritage real estate business will lose much of its protection. Whilst ONVIF has become a major force in video surveillance and is widely embraced by video surveillance manufacturers, it has yet to get the same acceptance by access control manufacturers. Manufactures here prefer to continue to be insular and proprietary. Not good news because continued growth for traditional proprietary systems mean limited options, central servers with complex and expensive cabling, as well as restricted possibilities for integration and scalability. "Integration between IP-based physical access control systems and video surveillance is nolonger considered a luxury in today’s market" The combination of IP and open systems will open up further opportunities for the access control business right across the physical security industry but not to those that stay proprietary. Continual product development Winning new business in this environment will be more competitive and will require continual product development, which is absolutely essential in order to maintain growth. The pace of change will speed up but it will remain a much more discreet market than video surveillance and is not yet subject to the disturbance of drastic price cutting from Chinese suppliers (although there is some evidence of this in the last three months). System integrators have in the last 3 years paid much more attention to developing their access control business for it is proving to be more profitable and stable and currently offers better growth prospects and less disruption than video surveillance. We expect them to push for open systems. This article has been taken from Memoori’s 8th edition of their Annual Report The Physical Security Business 2016 to 2021. Save