Why open matters in the age of AI

Artificial intelligence (AI) creates efficiencies throughout various industries, from managing teams to operating businesses. Key outcomes include faster investigations, fewer false alerts, automated operational checks, and quicker support experiences. These advancements free up valuable time for users, allowing them to focus on high-impact priorities that drive greater ROI.

When it comes to surveillance, AI is most visibly powering a new generation of vision language-powered video analytics, a technology that has adapted systems meant solely for security into solutions capable of identifying actionable insights and streamlining workflows.

Fast-moving AI landscape

When choosing a surveillance system powered by AI, it’s vital to select an open platform. To stay ahead in the fast-moving AI landscape, it’s more important than ever for businesses to choose an open platform that empowers them to adapt and innovate. In contrast to closed systems, an open platform enables flexible integration with existing security and business systems.

This offers businesses a greater return on their initial security investment while still providing an adaptable model built for the innovations of tomorrow. Below, we’ll look at the benefits provided by an open system in the age of AI, and how it can give you the strongest foundation to meet your goals.

Supercharge your existing system

An open platform also gives businesses the flexibility to scale security systems and add devices as needs evolve

Having to invest in entirely new security infrastructure while simultaneously deploying AI technology presents a variety of problems and risks for businesses. Your team will have to manage both rollouts for your teams at the same time, driving up higher costs and more issues with training.

By selecting an open platform, businesses can apply their newfound AI capabilities to existing cameras that weren’t built with analytics originally. Instead of having to completely replace your entire system, which can involve multiple weeks, months, or years of ripping out cabling and video security infrastructure, businesses can leverage analytics on the server itself to save valuable time while reducing deployment costs.

This gives cameras a new lifespan by unlocking all the advantages video analytics brings, including basics like person and vehicle detection and line crossing analytics, to provide additional power to system alerts and visual search capabilities. An open platform also gives businesses the flexibility to scale security systems and add devices as needs evolve. This approach enables organisations to upgrade at a more optimal pace, bringing in new devices when it best fits the budget and operational priorities.

Choose the solution that works best for you

With an open platform, businesses have the ability to find and select the AI solutions that work best for them. This gives organisations greater flexibility when implementing a video analytics solution. AI-enabled devices can be added in the timeframe that works best for your business or according to your needs.

For example, if a business needs a camera with edge-based slip-and-fall analytics for just one area of their facilities, an open platform enables integration with the best solution for that specific need without having to replace the entire system. This approach ensures you get maximum value from your investment while gaining the targeted benefits of video analytics. They can also bring onboard several analytic-enabled cameras while keeping the majority of their existing system, test different analytics offerings, or slowly phase out their old system.

This is all possible thanks to the open platform which gives businesses the freedom of choice to find the best solutions for their business needs.

Stay ready for what’s next

AI is a refined, intelligent technological triumph, and today is the lower level of skill it will ever produce

Finally, an open platform is inherently ready for future innovations, allowing businesses to stay ready for what’s next. AI is an advanced, intelligent technological achievement, and today is the lowest level of performance it will ever produce. The system investment you make today will need to be capable of taking advantage of the unknown but, undoubtedly, compelling features in five years' time. As new technologies continue to emerge, businesses can expand their ecosystem through an open platform, allowing them to integrate the applications that matter most to their business without being constrained by a single proprietary solution.

This reduces the risk businesses may feel by committing to a single platform. Instead, they can leverage existing technology, including hardware, lowering the overall cost up front and providing an opportunity to adopt and integrate future solutions down the road. This also helps keep your surveillance current and up to date while mitigating timeline issues with the rollout of new AI features and helping you get the most out of your investment. It also provides a way to test new solutions and continue optimising your system for your business.

Combining AI and an open platform

The open video platform is one of the best ways to ensure your business is getting the most out of the exciting advancements in AI. With as many data points as there are provided by a modern security system, having a way to bring that information together in an integrated place is key. Thanks to AI, that information can be parsed more efficiently for proactive insights into potential optimizations and visibility during critical events.

When finding the right video surveillance system for your business, be sure to select one that is not only AI-capable but also open. This will provide your organization with all of the benefits discussed above, including:

• Integrated Solutions: Thanks to the open platform, your business can still leverage existing hardware while using advanced video analytics on the recorder itself.
• Freedom of Choice: There’s no need to choose one system when it isn’t the best fit for your company. The open platform offers freedom of choice to leverage the best AI-powered technologies for your work.
• Futureproofed: As new innovations arise, you’ll be able to quickly integrate these cutting-edge technologies into your existing system without having to continually reinvent your system architecture.