‘Solutions’ Are the Focus of Revamped Chicago Axis Experience Center
On Oct. 9 Axis Communications held a grand reopening of its Axis Experience Center (AEC) in Chicago, which was expanded and revamped to focus on solutions that go beyond just network video to also include network access control and network audio systems, and how they all integrate with products from Axis’ technology partners. Highlights of the AEC are the new Solutions Lab where visitors can get hands on with technologies from Axis and its partners and the new Security Operations Center that emulates the platform used by the city of Chicago’s Office of Emergency Management, which monitors more than 30,000 cameras.
View the champagne toast and ceremonial ribbon cut here.
Posted: October 15, 2019
‘Solutions’ Are the Focus of Revamped Chicago Axis Experience Center
About 185 people attended the grand reopening of the Axis Experience Center in Chicago on Oct. 9, including integrators and their customers, security equipment distributors, and law enforcement professionals.
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A wall of patents is a new addition to the Axis Experience Center, showing 35 patents held by Axis, from among the company’s 1,621 registered patents and 751 pending patents. Each one includes information such as the patent number, date, the inventors, an abstract description of the patent, and even a diagram of how the invention works.
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Further down the wall at the Axis Experience Center (AEC) in Chicago is a panel with representative products from the company’s complete surveillance line. Visitors to the AEC can read more about each product using the “electronic catalog.” Another corridor at the end of the hallway leads to a conference room, a 40-person education center, and offices.
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In addition to refreshments, the Axis Experience Center (AEC) grand reopening on Oct. 9 in Chicago featured raffle prize drawings. The new AEC, which first opened in 2013, was nearly doubled in size, to 11,000 sq. ft., and includes the dynamic Solutions Lab shown here. The center is used for customer meetings and technology demonstrations, training, technology expos, corporate meetings, and much more. The company stressed that the revamped facility is for use by the security community at-large.
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In the completely new Solutions Lab at the Axis Experience Center in Chicago, visitors can get hands on with demonstrations of technologies from Axis and its partners including network cameras, VMS, analytics, switches and connectivity, network audio systems, network access control, facial recognition, license plate recognition, and custom solutions.
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The goal of the Axis Experience Center is to educate and to show technologies in a living environment, explained Axis’ Karl Radke, business area director – Midwest. “This facility is yours, it’s for you to bring your customers into to learn and understand the technology and to experience live, to help educate them and close business,” he remarked. Radke also described the company’s Custom Solutions competence. For example, Axis worked with the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) to enable cameras mounted in snow plow trucks to transmit video to the public. This is done by overlaying GPS coordinates of the camera devices in the plows, uploading the data via cell network to the DOT, then downloading it and overlaying it on a Google map. By clicking on any of the plow trucks on the map, a viewer can see what the truck driver sees concerning road conditions.
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All of the technology in the Axis Experience Center’s new Solutions Lab — including these ceiling-grid-mounted domes and more than 200 cameras altogether — runs on the Axis Camera Station VMS platform.
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One of many demonstrations in the Solutions Lab at the Chicago Axis Experience Center showed how an authorized user approaching and passing through an access control turnstile, for example, can trigger a camera mounted on a wall across the room to instantly train on the user. This entire facility was revamped to illustrate how, with its technology partners, Axis is focusing on more than just network video cameras, but on entire security solutions.
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The Security Operations Center (SOC) at the Axis Experience Center emulates the structure used by the city of Chicago OEMC, which includes 3,000 city-owned video channels and more than 30,000 additional cameras that originate from sister agencies, such as the Chicago Housing Authority and Chicago Police Department, all on the same platform. The SOC here also allows visitors to observe the servers and other equipment from Axis’ technology partners.
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In addition to the Chicago center, Axis Experience Centers are located in Boston, Washington D.C., Ft. Lauderdale, Dallas, Irvine, Calif., and (to come) New York and San Jose, Calif. A panel here shows Axis Communications’ worldwide presence and an alcove contains photos of the leadership team, as well as major equipment introductions throughout the years.
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From the very first network camera (pictured) — invented by Martin Gren and introduced to the market in 1996 — to a full line of surveillance products, access control products, and now network audio equipment, Axis Communications’ revamped Axis Experience Center in Chicago demonstrates all of these solutions.