One division of a national lender that provides financial services primarily to underserved customers, was faced with upgrading a legacy security camera system in several locations and expanding into additional locations that had been without the benefit of surveillance. With a disparate architecture that was ageing and weakening, the Director of Network Architecture wanted to partner with an organisation to not only replace its system, but make improvements to image resolution, video management and field of vision.
As an existing Konica Minolta customer, when Global Accounts Manager Michael Helderman contacted the lender to ask about security cameras, the timing could not have been better. With primary services of short-term lending and check cashing, each neighbourhood location has a lot of cash on site. Thus, the Director of Loss Prevention was eager to get a new system in place for better visibility into each branch location.
Solution
The Intelligent Security Solutions Regional Manager–Sales/PS, Derek Martinez, was added to the conversation– and the team put together a paid proof-of-concept for “Store Zero” to spotlight the MOBOTIX cameras and the key features of providing a greater field of vision per camera and high-resolution images.
Konica Minolta shows the flexibility of a decentralised, cloud-based camera network versus on-premise
Throughout the process, Konica Minolta was able to demonstrate the flexibility of a decentralised, cloud-based camera network versus on-premise, so the Direct of Store Operations could have visibility into all of the lender locations. And since the team utilised System Surveyor™ for design, she could visualise how each camera’s field of vision was wider than their previous cameras. This enabled a greater coverage area and allowed the lender to reduce the number of cameras needed from an average of 15 to eight cameras per location.
MOBOTIX intelligent security solution
According to Martinez, the proof-of-concept was put against another camera provider. MOBOTIX intelligent security solution was able to surpass the other providers with its German-made IOT camera devices, image qualify, lower wattage usage (one-half of most other camera providers), more expansive field-of-vision, information access with the cloud and a centralised software platform–enabling the lender to “see more with less.”
The lender has become a client partner for this project, opting to do their own installation with their existing low voltage department (LVD). With no two sites exactly alike, the lender handled their own cabling for the installations, and received training on System Surveyor so they could create their own designs. Konica Minolta set up each camera to be cloud-ready, pre-programmed and pre-kitted.
This added-value service enabled the LVD to simply "plug-in" a ready device once their site had been set up. With locations in 34 states, the roll-out is on a one-year timeline with the lender installing approximately 10 locations per week. As the Director of Loss Prevention notes, “Personally, I can’t wait until we are 100% installed so I can really utilise this new software tool, and see into any site with very clear MOBOTIX camera images.”
