New Report reveals England set to be early adopter of cloud-based video monitoring now that analogue CCTV to network video ‘tipping point’ has been breached and VSaaS offerings are expanding feature sets rapidly
England is Cloud CCTV demand ‘hot spot’
NW Security launched today its 36 page Management Report entitled ‘Preparing for the Next Generation of CCTV Systems’. The report brings together all results and analysis based on England-wide market research it conducted of medium and large sized firms running CCTV systems.
The Report reveals that England is poised to become an early and rapid adopter of Cloud CCTV. It explores why 58 per cent of all firms captured in its survey of CCTV system users, are planning to migrate their existing CCTV systems into the cloud by September 2021.
Amongst private sector more than two thirds (71 per cent) of CCTV users were actively considering migrating their video systems into the cloud.
Network video ‘tipping point’ breached
One of the key reasons for the strong appetite for ‘Cloud CCTV’ migration, the NW Security Report finds, is that although the UK was late to moving to network video from traditional analogue-based CCTV because of its widespread adoption of CCTV more than 25 years ago; the CCTV to network video tipping point has finally been breached across all sectors.
Sixty one per cent of England-based medium and large businesses now have network video monitoring systems rather than traditional analogue-based CCTV systems, the study found.
Wider cloud push accelerated by COVID-19
NW Security’s report also plots the increase in demand for Cloud CCTV as part of the wider acceleration of cloud migration plans in response to COVID-19. COVID-19 has created a rapid increase in demand for access to corporate IT applications and Management Information systems remotely, as so many of us spent most of our working week operating away from the traditional workplace.
Cloud CCTV demand fits with wider cloud migration plans which have been accelerated in response to COVID-19. Forty two per cent of all medium and large-sized businesses admitted that their ‘cloud migration plans are being accelerated in 2020/21 because of COVID-19’. A further 34 per cent increased budgets to put more IT services and applications into the cloud following the outbreak of the pandemic.
Three quarters (76 per cent) of all firms which completed NW Security’s online survey confirmed that they had accelerated cloud migration plans as a result of the pandemic.
In-house control of CCTV slowly moving from Security & FM to IT departments
Perhaps one of the more surprising findings of this study was the fact that a third (33 per cent) of all businesses’ CCTV systems captured in NW Security’s study were still run by in-house Security or Facilities Management departments.
However, now that more CCTV systems are networked than not, and Cloud CCTV migration is being actively considered by over half of organisations this year, NW Security believes IT departments will end up in charge of much more than the quarter (27 per cent) of video monitoring systems within the next couple of years.
As Frank Crouwel, Managing Director of NW Security commented in the Report:
“Many IT managers are being forced to take a deeper interest (in their organisations’ CCTV systems) now that the technology and security installer partner capability is available to upgrade and improve CCTV systems – potentially moving them up into the cloud and exploring AI-driven video analytics capabilities which will come as standard in the next generation of CCTV systems.”
Learn more about video analytics Learn more about cloud CCTV
Need for greater collaboration to manage ‘Next Gen’ CCTV
Surprisingly today, only 10 per cent of systems are supported by an external CCTV/network video specialist installer, NW Security’s study found. Yet with so much new technology coming in so quickly; and the pressure to migrate video monitoring into the cloud growing, deeper partnerships with external experts with combined pools of IT networking, cloud migration and professional security expertise are likely to gain ground, the Report finds.
Frank Crouwel, confirms first-hand experience of this partnership approach:
“We are seeing more businesses looking for help from expert partners for improvement and optimisation of CCTV systems to ensure they are getting optimal value from their existing systems.”
NW Security Group believes that the CCTV market is undergoing fundamental change and plans to investigate the implications of that change in a second study that it will run later this year.
Notes to Editors:
The full report can be downloaded above.
Nationally-respected market research firm Opinium executed NW Security’s survey which was completed by 101 IT decision makers of firms with more than 50 employees based in England, between 8th and 14th September 2020. Only firms with CCTV systems were invited to complete the survey.
Respondents were heavily-weighted towards senior IT Decision Makers: 29 per cent were IT Managers, 33 per cent IT directors, 10 per cent CTOs, eight per cent CIOs and seven per cent Operations Directors. The balance were Operations Managers or equivalent.
The NW Security Report is an amalgam of all quantitative findings from the survey and analyses of what these findings are likely to mean for the professional security market looking forward.
About NW Security Group
Acknowledging the on-premise to off-premise shift, NW Security has augmented its highly reliable and well-specified IP Video offering with Cloud CCTV services and hybrid solutions, with the option of storing video data on-site as well as in the cloud.
As IT and security continue on a path towards convergence, technologies such as intelligent video analytics, cloud hosting and on-demand access are increasingly considered to be core elements of video monitoring solutions.
These features allow customers to overcome traditional security and safety challenges by empowering staff to make informed decisions in real-time. They can also provide valuable business insights to managers. It is efficiency gains like this that lead to quantifiable return on investment (ROI).
NW Security goes beyond the role of just being an IP camera installer and works collaboratively with customers to alleviate the burden on IT Managers during the deployment and ongoing maintenance of customers’ IP or cloud-based CCTV systems. Its knowledgeable team of engineers and technicians can bring many years of experience working on video network infrastructures of all sizes to bear to ensure compliance with best practice standards are delivered.
Today, NW Security Group is recognised as one of the leaders in IP video technology in the UK working with premier partners including Axis, Milestone and Morphean, striving to remain at the forefront of technological advancements in the security market going forward.
