Demand vs supply in wireless mobile video surveillance

A report from IMS Research shows that a surplus supply of wireless download technology was fitted to 16% of all video recorders sold in mobile video surveillance markets last year.

This surplus is technology that the customer either doesn’t intend to use, or doesn’t have the back-end software to support. The report, ‘The World Market for Mobile Video Surveillance’, asks whether this means manufacturers are wasting their money on oversupply.

The researchers tracked the adoption rates of wireless download technology across each vertical market - one of the fastest moving trends in mobile video surveillance in the past two years.

“Adoption rates have increased quickly; the technology really suits the usage cases for these larger fleets of trains, buses or police cars,” says senior analyst David Green, adding that using Wi-Fi for downloading saves time and cost for the operator, improves reliability and offers added value features, such as remote vehicle health checks.

In 2012, however, it seemed that demand lagged behind supply. While 45% of recorders sold were fitted with Wi-Fi that the customer will use, 16% were fitted with technology the customer won’t use.

“In reality, manufacturers won’t be losing out,” Green said. “The 16% number might sound a lot in terms of unit shipments, but it’s only a small portion of the revenue. Economies of scale mean the component costs will be low to start with, plus most of the oversupply is coming from recorders made by low-cost, Asian manufacturers. These companies can’t move on price since they’re already at the bottom, so they compete with each other by loading up on features - even though they know the customers won’t use them.

“You take a look at the high-end manufacturers and the level of oversupply is certainly less than 16%,” Green noted.

Green says mobile video systems are evolving and wireless is a key part of the more intelligent system, linking with back-end software to provide an end-to-end solution. He says that manufacturers aren’t wasting their money; they’ll see rewards when the market sees a boost in sales over the next couple of years.