STANLEY Security: “Merge video, intruder and access and you learn how your organisation works”

Sitting at 228 on the Fortune 500, Stanley Black & Decker is a behemoth in the design and manufacture of industrial tools, household hardware and security products.

STANLEY Security is the company’s umbrella brand for a raft of innovators in physical and logical security, encompassing intruder, access control and video surveillance systems, among others.

Stanley Black & Decker, which emerged from the 2010 merger of Stanley Works and Black & Decker, has snapped up myriad companies over the years.

Yet James Ford, director of global marketing at STANLEY Security, admits that even a company with as many brands in its stable as STANLEY can’t possibly have expertise in all areas. In an interview with IFSEC Global he stresses that partnering with specialists in other fields in order to provide customers with end-to-end solutions was a priority for the company, as was grappling with cybersecurity.

He also discussed the latest products from STANLEY brands like PACOM , PAC GDX and 3XLOGIC.

IFSEC Global: How does Stanley fit into a fast-changing market for physical security systems?

James Ford: Stanley as a global business has been on a really fast, progressive growth strategy for a number of years.

We started with tools, then came a number of acquisitions: Black and Decker, DeWalt, Craftsman… But the company recognises that digital technology is going to be a differentiator that will drive things forward – whether that’s connected tools or parallel connected technology spaces.

In our security product portfolios, our core strengths are access, intrusion and video management – and the integration of these systems.

We think we see a number of trends. Cyber and physical: Where do they stop and start? What’s the differentiator?

We have more and more customers who are no longer differentiating between the two. Traditionally you’d be protecting against someone smashing the window, running in and stealing something physically. Now that same person is swimming up the Ethernet pipe and stealing your data!

It’s ironic that the security system designed to protect your building could actually be the weak spot

It’s still security. But the physical security industry has been quite slow in responding. And it’s ironic that the security system designed to protect your building could actually be the weak spot.

Then there’s the cloud, which brings benefits in terms of simplicity of network structure and installation.  But then having it outside the company’s infrastructure might be seen as introducing risk. So we’ve worked hard to make sure our integrity is very high – because no one wants a security system that’s inherently insecure!

We have great technology in access control, video management and business intelligence/data analysis. So when you start to merge these things, how can that add value to customers? How can we give them better productivity or information or help them make faster decisions? How can we automate to solve their problems?

So by bringing cybersecurity, physical security and big data together – and that’s where STANLEY Product & Technology is heading – we feel that’s a big differentiator to a lot of businesses today that tend to traditionally be in one space or another.

3xLOGIC

IG: Stanley has acquired a number of businesses in this industry over the years. How do the acquired brands benefit from operating under your umbrella?

JF: We’re like any business that acquires a company – we do it for turnover and profit, customer base, brand, equity, technology. But when you buy these businesses you don’t want to destroy the brand.

Not always, but generally speaking, we like to keep and leverage the brands we acquire [under their existing name]. We leverage the strength of that brand. So for example we acquired PACOM a few years ago and it is very strong in banking and financial institutions and high security environments.

PAC GDX is also very strong in commercial access control and social housing for entry systems. 3XLOGIC (our latest acquisition) is very strong in the US in mid-sized access control and video management systems and now in business data analytics.

We don’t suffer from ‘not-invented-here syndrome’

We don’t want to lose that; we want to build on it.

And where there are other companies doing things well, we don’t suffer from ‘not-invented-here syndrome’. We know we’re experts in our space, but we want to partner or integrate with others who are experts in different spaces.

People use the term ‘open systems’. I think that’s a little bit loose, but we do like to integrate and interface with lots of different technologies where it makes strategic sense.

GDX

IG: And how are those customer needs evolving?

JF: When people think of banking, for instance, they tend to think of branches. But banking now is more about compliance and head office.

They’re also really interested in footfall. Not just access control stopping someone getting out of an area but also, is that area being used? In a building that has really expensive real estate, like Canary Wharf, could we close down a floor somewhere to cut costs?

This is where business intelligence comes in. By merging video, intruder and access we can start to form a picture of how your organisation works.

IG: Any recent or imminent product launches worth mentioning?

JF: We’re bringing 3xLOGIC [cloud and server-based video, access control and business intelligence solution] into Europe.

And the next generation of PACOM Unison, an integrated access video management system.

These are quite significant steps for us. We’re also working on new platforms for PACOM GMS [Graphical Management System], which is aimed at the banking market. [PACOM GMS is “a multi-site security management platform, providing integration between access control, alarm monitoring, video surveillance, elevator, intercom, fire, building automation and many other building services into a single, remotely-accessible solution.”]

And we’re releasing our latest GDX range to complement PAC8 [a one-door controller for system installation and management via the PAC8 App], which we launched earlier in the year.

So pretty active. And we invest more than double digits of our revenue back into R&D.

I’m a real believer in: “You don’t grow if you don’t drive forwards”.

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