Year: 2019

Broadband Adoption in the Critical Communications Industry With the growing appetite for broadband-enabled data applications, and the increasing possibility of spectrum allocation in many parts of the world, the market for private/ hybrid broadband networks for private mobile radio (PMR) users will continue to expand across multiple sectors. As a result, the critical communications industry will move towards a mix of broadband-capable network solutions e.g., private long term evolution (LTE) or the various operating models possible with commercial and private LTE. It is unlikely that users will adopt broadband solutions to the exclusion of existing licensed mobile radio (LMR), but adoption will be along the lines of a complementary service that allows users to communicate across LMR and cellular networks, depending on specific operational requirements. Indeed, work is progressing on the development of products and services, with an increasing number of manufacturers and commercial mobile operators entering the critical communications market. The second European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) Mission Critical Push to Talk (MCPTT) Plugtests™ event was held earlier this year, where as well as voice, mission critical data and mission critical video interworking capabilities were tested for the first time. This work is expected to evolve as 3GPP takes more requirements from different sectors of the global critical communications industry on board. Revenue projections by sector: Revenues utilities – From $164m in 2018 to $460m in 2022 – increase of 181 per cent. Revenues public safety – From $2.9bn in 2018 to $6.9bn in 2022 – increase of 140 percent. Revenues transport – From $433m in 2018 to $938m in 2022 – increase of 116 per cent. Revenues industrial – From $319m in 2018 to $700m in 2022 – increase of 119 per cent The figures include revenues from infrastructure, mobile services and applications, lte devices, managed services and system integration. IHS Markit definitions of LTE networks revenue projections: Hybrid: Revenues attributed to data/ PTT over LTE over a combination (hybrid) of private networks based on commercial cellular technology and public commercial cellular networks that have dedicated access enhancements for users. Private: Data over private networks (100% privately owned infrastructure) based on LTE cellular technology. <- Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |  Next ->

Licensed Mobile Radio Trends Overview Licensed mobile radio (LMR) deployments continue to increase globally, despite the emergence of LTE solutions onto the world stage and 5G on the horizon. Government and commercial sectors increasingly rely on LMR for secure, instant and reliable voice communications, so cost-optimized digital technologies, TETRA, P25, TETRAPOL and other major digital LMR technologies continue to attract investment. The United Kingdom, a pioneer of LTE technology, announced only in 2018 that it would extend its nationwide Airwave TETRA network to at least 2022 to provide mission critical communications to its emergency services despite the establishment of the nationwide UKESN LTE network. Overall digitization continues in the industry, as the number of digital users exceeded the number of analog users for the first time in 2017. However, there are a significant number of analog users who have not yet converted to digital-radio protocols. The global success of digital technologies has been multifaceted, as multi-tiered options, greater competition and advances in capabilities have provided an increasingly cost-effective migration path from analog to digital communications. Increasing awareness of the benefits of LMR technology for mission-critical and business-critical organizations around the world has facilitated this growth, and users are turning to trunked cost-optimized digital solutions to meet their scalable communications requirements. The deployment of trunked networks has increased significantly over the last couple of years, as transportation hubs, utilities companies, mines, and public safety and security organizations have adopted the following technologies: TETRA has proven itself the technology of choice for emergency services, and European public safety and security continues to be the backbone of the TETRA market, although the largest growth will come from the Americas and Asia. As TETRA becomes more popular around the world it will continue to spread into business-critical sectors, such as transportation, utilities and industrial. Cost-optimized digital technology, which includes digital mobile radio (DMR), digital private mobile radio (dPMR), next-generation digital narrowband (NXDN) and police digital trunked (PDT), has also been successful globally. The largest markets in 2017 were North America and Asia, with Asia accounting for half of all deployments. Cost-optimized digital technologies will be more prevalent in commercial sectors in developed economies with nationwide networks, and in public safety and security organizations in developing regions where no nationwide network exists. APCO Project P25 (P25) will also continue to increase its footprint, with the world’s largest single P25 market located in North America, where P25 is the de-facto mission-critical communications standard for public safety and security agencies. Suppliers of P25 continued to enjoy the spoils of continued investment in public safety in North America, with large-scale network upgrades in 2018, like Motorola Solutions contracts to modernize the P25 network in Portsmouth, Virginia, in a multi-million-dollar deal to provide P25 technology to its emergency services and the Harris deal to upgrade the US customs and border protection (CBP) network. North America is forecast to remain the largest global market for P25, holding more than three quarters of the world’s P25 users; however, P25 has also permeated elsewhere in the global market. TETRAPOL continues to attract refreshment cycles, as high-end government agencies rely on the security and resilience that TETRAPOL offers. Examples include the Fort Irwin United States Army training base in California, which opted to upgrade its network with TETRAPOL Internet Protocol (IP) technology in 2018, and a midlife upgrade of the POLYCOM network in Switzerland, which will extend the life of the network to 2030 and beyond. Competitive LMR landscape As the digital LMR market continues to grow, the competitive landscape also becomes more intense, as suppliers continue to innovate, invest in research and development, and users are offered more and more viable communications solutions. Over the years, the industry has undergone a process of consolidation and collaboration, with some key acquisitions, including the Hytera acquisition of Sepura in 2017 and a number of Motorola Solutions acquisitions, including Interexport, Kodiak and next generation 911 software from Airbus DS. JVC Kenwood highlighted its commitment to global LMR markets, acquiring Radio Activity S.R.L. in 2018 and announcing that it plans to buy shares in Tait, a global supplier of P25 and DMR solutions. Despite market consolidation, the overall landscape has become more competitive. Increased price competition has reduced barriers to entry, and technological innovations have increased the number of choices, either by provider or protocol. LMR still growing, as LTE gets established Despite the emergence of LTE technology, LMR adoption will continue to grow, as LTE becomes more established and proves its capability to meet the specific critical voice communications requirements of emergency services. In the short term, LTE will complement critical voice with data, rather than replace LMR altogether, as investment into LTE is required to continue to increase coverage and resilience. Only in the next five to ten years could LTE substitute for TETRA, TETRAPOL or other high-end LMR technologies, as capital investments are considered in nationwide or large-scale deployments.   <- Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |  Next ->

SaaS Driving Next Generation Emergency Response By – Alex Richardson The transition toward SaaS, a shift, while very much underway in the consumer and commercial sectors, has been picking up pace significantly over the last year in the public safety sector. Historically, agencies in the United States in this case, had been very hesitant to deploy solutions via anything other than on premises. A confluence of factors is catalyzing this shift, and it was evident at shows such as International Wireless Communications Exhibition (IWCE) and International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), that the emergency response software market is heading in a new direction. The core emergency response technologies, computer-aided dispatch and records management software, are increasingly beginning to be deployed via SaaS. Discussions with these vendors during the IACP conference in Orlando, Florida, United States indicated varying degrees of adoption. Some smaller to mid-sized vendors such as Mark43 and Omnigo had 100% and 90% of new clients deploying SaaS based CAD and RMS. Larger vendors such as Motorola also noticed an increasing shift. A further trend picking up substantial pace this year was integration capability and analytical functionality. Several vendors including Motorola and Hexagon were offering subscription-based services to products that integrate data from CAD, RMS, surveillance cameras, sensors and other sources onto a common platform. A key goal with these platforms was to leverage and pull together data from all existing infrastructure and systems, and bring the data onto one screen. Analytics could then be applied to the data to highlight where crime was a recurring issue, allowing law enforcement to better allocate personnel in the field. Overall, this signals a shift from responsive policing to predictive and preventative policing, and technology is driving that change. The future for emergency response solutions deployed via SaaS looks bright. Firstly, law enforcement is becoming more open to SaaS due to a better understanding of the functionality, security features and cost and operational benefits of these solutions. Secondly, public safety technology oriented initiatives such as Next generation 911 and FirstNet, are driving a wide-scale revamp to emergency communications both technologically and operationally. With next generation 911, proprietary infrastructure is often replaced with hardware and software that has more open architecture. Open systems are more scalable, provide standard interfaces for integration, are less costly to maintain and offer desirable new features. Additionally, they can be shared among multiple agencies when based on Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) communication systems. Solutions deployed via SaaS go hand-in-hand with the aforementioned initiatives, because they promote interoperability and multi-agency collaboration, and can address the current gap between capabilities of emergency response technology and what is available in the consumer/ commercial sector. There is a huge focus on using business intelligence for public safety to improve operations, resourcing and dispatching efficiency. SaaS is a technology that facilitates the solutions to tackle those challenges, and 2019 will likely be an important year for the continued development of next generation emergency response technology solutions. <- Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |  Next ->

Electronic Access Control Systems: Year-end Review and Forecast IHS Markit projects that the market for physical electronic access control solutions has grown to over $5.2 billion in 2018. The market has experienced stable and predictable growth rates that have hovered around 6 percent over the past several years. Electronic locks remain both the largest and the fastest growing product type in access control, representing nearly 40% of the global market size for all access control equipment. While market growth rates have been consistent, technological developments have dramatically impacted the market in 2018. The most prominent trend involves mobile credentials, which are poised to revolutionize the longstanding business model for access control system sales. The mobile credentials market was still in its infancy in 2018, but many end-users are already anticipating a transition to these credentials by installing compatible readers in their systems. By 2020, over 10 percent of all new readers sold in the market will be compatible with mobile credentials. Other trends to watch in 2019 and beyond include Access Control as a Service (ACaaS), which allow endusers to avoid the need to invest in costly on-site IT infrastructures to support their access control equipment. ACaaS solutions will be particularly popular to support small and mid-sized projects that service less than fifty doors. In addition, Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons will support geopositioning in an increasing number of the world’s most advanced access control systems. Through geopositioning, the exact location of specific personnel can be identified at any site in real-time. The top fifteen access control vendors represent more than half of the total size of the global access control market, but there are pockets of opportunity for new vendors, particularly to accommodate small and mid-sized projects. The mobile credential and ACaaS markets will also be highly competitive in 2019 and should attract an influx of new market entrants. <- Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |  Next ->

App Stores for the Security Industry An increasing number of vendors are marketing app ecosystems for video surveillance cameras. This is a further manifestation of increased processing power at the edge and a de-centralized architecture. However, apps for video surveillance cameras are not a new concept. The revival of app based ecosystems has synced with the resurgence of interest in video analytics, fueled by deep-learning technological advances. This means many of the new apps available for compatible cameras are based around deep learning video analytics. This was not the case for previous apps. Notable examples of video surveillance camera app ecosystems announced in 2018 include: Huawei’s software defined camera. The Bosch backed SAST start up and associated open security and safety alliance. These are in addition to existing platforms including: The Axis Communications camera application platform. Cisco IP Camera Apps. All these platforms offer downloadable software applications onto compatible network cameras through an app store. These all potentially offer the ability to change the capabilities of the camera remotely through downloadable software. Huawei’s ‘software defined camera’ name borrows an IT term “software defined” to market this. Critics of the video surveillance camera app ecosystem concept have raised the following concerns: Once system configuration is complete, it is rare that the camera function needs to be changed. For example, the video analytic function or the type of VMS are rarely changed after the camera is installed. At present, the majority of surveillance cameras are required for security purposes and need to record their footage for review in case of an incident. It is unlikely that these cameras will be suitably positioned for their use to be changed for other applications like business intelligence. Despite these concerns, having an open standard and operating system specifically for security and IoT devices means different hardware and software vendors can use the same platform. In theory, this enables easy configuration of best-of-breed components, with more flexibility for changes and tighter cybersecurity controls than just standard interoperability protocols allow. This could also mean system configurations and camera applications are able to change more often due to an easier delivery model provided by the app ecosystem, not constrained by the current more manual and time-consuming processes. With the app store ecosystem allowing for remote direct software sales and even installation, significant investment will be required from each app developer in adequate technical and configuration support. Especially, if they are to build a successful and highly rated app for security and IoT devices. Regardless of the need for changing software applications on video surveillance cameras, the ‘app store’ model could be a significant disruptor to the video surveillance industry’s traditional sales channel and software licensing model. Once different (non-video) IoT devices are also on the same platform and operating system, greater device interconnectivity and convergence is also likely. Despite not being a new concept, app ecosystems could be a disruptive force for not just video surveillance but other security and IoT technologies in 2019 onwards. <- Previous | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |  Next ->

Deep Learning Analytics at the Edge In 2018 deep learning analytics were nearly all processed either on a server or in the cloud, not at the edge. However, 2019 will be the year of the embedded deep learning application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) system on a chip (SOC). Due to the power requirements of current GPU hardware, deep-learning analytics have typically had to run on servers. However, the transition of deep learning out to the edge has already begun. NVIDIA offers the Jetson embedded computing platform that allows edge-based inferencing. However, the Jetson platform is an all-purpose GPU not specifically designed for video surveillance cameras. Intel’s Myriad X VPU is the third generation VPU from Movidius and features the Neural Compute Engine – a dedicated hardware accelerator for deep neural network inferences. Deep-learning analytics are also being deployed exclusively in the cloud using Video Analytics as a Service (VAaaS) solutions with just the simple addition of a gateway edge device. When deep learning-enabled cameras were first launched in 2016, very few AI chipset options were available. NVIDIA’s Jetson and Movidius’s Myriad were often used in deep learning-enabled camera product demonstrations. However, high prices and high-power consumption of these chips meant the early specific AI chipsets has limited adoption in cameras. IHS Markit expects that in the next few years, the SOCs designed for network cameras will be capable of performing the basic processing required for deep learning analytics to run on the camera, without the need for additional processing power. The ASIC SOCs will be beneficial for large scale production aimed at the price sensitive mass market. ASIC SOCs with lower power consumption and a more compact design are being developed. Both established semiconductor giants and smaller startups are developing ASICs for use in deep learning-enabled cameras increasing competition in this area. Currently both Ambarella and HiSilicon, a subsidiary of Huawei, are developing ASIC SOCs for network cameras. Ambarella has already released the CV2S SOC, however, this chipset is presently too high priced and overly powerful for mass market video surveillance requirements. It is likely to be used for autonomous vehicles. But, currently in development, and due to be released in early 2019, the CV22s includes CVflow architecture that provides the DNN (Deep Neural Network) processing required for deep learning analytics. Similar to Ambarella, HiSilicon is developing the Hi3559A SOC with a CNN accelerator to allow the processing deep learning analytics; Whilst Qualcomm will soon be releasing the QCS605. The level of inference is something that can be changed with tradeoffs in features, accuracy, frames rates, and resolution, but IHS Markit expects that 0.2 Deep Learning Tera-operations per Second (DL TOPS) is enough for a basic classification network with low frame rates. IHS Markit expects that by 2022, 50% of network cameras shipped globally will include a deep learning accelerator that can provide between 0.5 to 2 DL TOPS. This will allow cameras to do basic object detection and classification leading some to describe it as ‘the motion detection of tomorrow’ hinting it will become a standard feature. Additionally, it is not expected that deep learning accelerators will add any significant cost to the price of the SOCs. It is expected that the development of edge-to-core  processing will become significantly more common in the coming years. As such more powerful edge devices will help distribute the required workload. It is not expected that these edge devices will replace the need for central server or cloud processing, but instead will complement each other. Next ->