Business intelligence applications — made possible by surveillance cameras, video analytics, and video management systems — are a growing opportunity for integrators who can accrue the skills and show clients the return on investment.
The scope of video surveillance-based solutions now extends beyond just security, which presents a new business opportunity for systems integrators. Sophisticated business customers — particularly retailers with multiple outlets — are leveraging video surveillance equipment to support their marketing and merchandising and to enhance operations by counting customers, tracking how long customers spend in different parts of a store and matching video with information from point-of-sale systems to gain business insight. Applications such as these are known as “business intelligence” and although business intelligence is somewhat of a niche market today, it is an area that is growing fast and one that security integrators may want to consider pursuing.
Integrators are taking many different approaches to business intelligence. At one end of the spectrum are nationwide integrators that undertake considerable development work to provide customers with highly customized applications. At the other end are smaller integrators who are finding that business intelligence doesn’t have to be complicated; it just has to be approached with a creative mind.