According to IMS Research, 2013 will be the tipping point for when sales of network video surveillance equipment overtake analog.
A recently published report by the market research firm, "IP Trends in Security – A Survey of Systems Integrators and Installers," found that 80 percent of North American systems integrators and installers currently purchase some IP-based surveillance equipment from IT distributors. This is expected to increase to 90 percent over the next three years.
"The arrival of IP-technology has instead bought its own questions, and simultaneously changed the shape of the market place," IMS wrote in a statement. "With the emergence of IP-based technology, IT distributors and IT integrators are now, increasingly, competing with traditional security distributors and security integrators."
Bandwidth is still a "limiting concern" for IP video technologies, however, available bandwidth and broadband speeds are expected to continue to increase. According to IMS, the U.S. has an average broadband speed of around 5.8 Mbps, which ranks 12th in the world.
Another factor that is driving growth in the adoption of network video products is the influence of IT managers on purchasing decisions. The IMS report found that IT managers were ranked ahead of physical security managers, chief security officers and consultants when it came to influencing which network video products would be selected for a given project.
"One reason for this influence may be the fact that IT budgets are typically larger than the associated security budgets. Instead of security managers buying an IP-camera and speaking with the IT department about how to incorporate it into the network, increasingly the IT department will buy the security equipment from their budget and incorporate the device into their network," IMS wrote.
For more information about the report, visit http://imsresearch.com.
