A new Redbox kiosk arrived recently outside my local pharmacy. If you are from the United States or certain parts of Canada you will know exactly what Redbox is. For those of you not from North America, let me explain.
Redbox is the North American replacement for Blockbuster, which went out of business in the US some time ago. Blockbuster may have gone, but that hasn’t stopped Redbox from riding its coattails beyond the grave.
Redbox is a self-contained, fully automated, DVD rental kiosk. For as little as 99 cents you can rent a physical DVD, just as you once could from Blockbuster. However, unlike Blockbuster, Redbox is making a fortune out of a business that it knows is destined to fail.
In the end, streaming video from companies like Apple, Sony, and Netflix will win the race. DVD rental companies are very aware of this, yet Redbox continues to profit in a dying niche with good timing and rapid execution. This finally brings me back to why we are all here: the security industry.
The very same battle is taking place right now among analogue CCTV, HDcctv, and IP.
Analogue is dying, and HDcctv addresses a niche group of installers that refuse to move to IP, but have customers who expect an HD solution.
By providing HD video (up to 1080p) over coaxial cable in a plug-and-play installation like traditional analogue cameras and DVRs, HDcctv allows integrators to install an HD solution without replacing cable or learning how to network IP cameras.
Executed properly, HDcctv should be able to capitalise on a significant number of analogue users as they reluctantly make the transition to IP. Unfortunately, HDcctv has not had the perfect timing Redbox has, at least not in North America or Europe.
Redbox was effective in the United States because it launched before Blockbuster was dead and before users had been forced to adapt to online rentals.
H.264 codec
For HDcctv to have the same success it would have needed to have a product on the market before the release of H.264, the compression codec that shrunk storage costs and led to the rapid adoption of IP technology for surveillance.
It is too late for HDcctv to gain market share in North America or Europe. Integrators that want to sell HD have already spent the money to train their technicians in IP technology. There is no incentive for them to switch back now.
There is still hope however.
HDcctv may have missed opportunities in the most obvious markets, but that doesn’t mean it cannot become the CCTV equivalent of Redbox somewhere else.
First though, it will need to reposition itself as an alternative to analogue (not IP surveillance), especially in markets that have already made the transition to IP.
Instead it must target areas like Asia/Pacific that still have a stable analogue market. Markets like these are beginning to go through the growing pains of moving to IP and over the next few years would welcome a product like HDcctv.
Redbox is a company I respect for filling a need where others have already given up, and it’s being handsomely rewarded for taking that risk.
HDcctv is a product that I believe could be the perfect solution for the equivalent void in the surveillance market, but not by competing with IP in markets where the void has already been filled.
HDcctv will not beat IP, but it still has an application in the industry.
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I agree with some of your comments Colin. If a customer has an existing analogue system but only requires one or two HD cameras then it is an easy retro fit to facilitate them with IP. It will still always come down to cost and while IP becomes cheaper by the day HD over coax is still not so cost effective. With Hybrid NVR’s and VMS software that can integrate the technology’s i cant see a way in for this technology.
Colin — Loved this post. I thought, when I started reading it, that you were going to simply dismiss the HDcctv standard as too late. But I love that you’ve still seen a potential opportunity for the technology to make growth in. With so many manufacturers having looked seriously at HDcctv, it’s reassuring that you don’t think all is lost!
Out of interest then, has anyone installed a HDCCTV system? and what where the pros and cons of the install?
One obstacle to HDCCTV, at least in the US, is the universal acceptance of IP by the IT folks. They are increasingly involved in CCTV procurement and are extremely standards oriented. IP is a well understood established standard with cross-industry support. HDCCTV seems to many like a step backward to proprietary standards.
But, to answer your question, none of our clients have ever even asked about or heard of HDCCTV. There’s simply no interest that we have found outside of industry trade shows.
Two other reasons for the success of Redbox are cost and convenience. At $1 a disk (slightly more for bluray), a Redbox rental costs less than video on demand (typically $2-$7). Even if you keep it for two days, you’re still ahead. Redbox also allows you to return a disk anywhere, not just at the box you picked it up at. And, since the boxes are so prevalent, you’re almost certain to be driving by one wherever you go. Redbox also allows you to rent a disk on line or on a phone app and pick it up by swiping… Read more »
And we all know how much we love discussing these things at industry trade shows. So as long as the IT crowd continue their inexorable march into being involved in physical security, HDcctv will remain… a slight outsider perhaps.
You’re absolutely right. That is why HDcctv really needs to focus on competing with analog technology in markets where analog is still seeing growth.
Take a look at what Pelco is doing, they are developing new analog cameras despite the fact that everyone knows analog is not going to see any growth in the North American market. However it’s important to realize that Pelco is not developing these cameras for North America, they are for Asia/Pacific. A market that will still see analog camera growth over the next few years.
While the growth days of analog in the US market are long gone, there’s still a huge legacy market. Many analog cameras are replaced with newer analog cameras (rather than IP) when they fail – after all, if the existing system is serving its’ purpose, many don’t see the need to upgrade it. And while overall market growth may be stagnant, there’s always the option of taking market share away from others who are no longer maintaining their legacy product lines.
If adopting IP cameras is easy, if IP cameras are not intrinsically more expensive, if converting to IP in the cameras makes images better, if the only obstacle to every camera being an IP camera is the irrational reluctance of CCTV installers, then VGA IP cameras would have displaced CCTV cameras after 16 years of trying. The fact is, however, that VGA IP cameras is a failed product category, for these reasons and more. The mega-trend in our industry is a migration to HD surveillance, which the customer sees, and not a migration to IP video, wihch the customer does… Read more »
I agree with Robert, there is still (in the UK anyway) a good market for analogue technology bit it legacy or new installs. Some customers do not want IP CCTV systems as yet. Some due to cost and some don’t see the need for IP unless you are going megapixel.
I do agree that certainly in smaller installs, where there’s little need to ugrade, why would people? It’s an unneccessary expense, especially at a time when budgets are tight. But if you’re installing new, why not install something that’s going to be future-proofed. The market for analogue won’t disappear on any night, but it’ll keep going one way. @rockoff’s comments are useful as well. Converting to IP can be anywhere within the system. I’ve asked before, and wondered, when we say IP solution, we need to define all parts of the system.
‘The answer “always in the camera” lacks technical merit.’ – and doesn’t look at the whole picture as you say @Todd Rockoff. On your other point, it’s not the end user who wants an IP solution — they don’t care how their video is delivered. But increasingly, it’s integrators from an IT background who go for it, because it’s what they know. That’s what I was saying earlier.
I have to agree, the end user doesn’t usually care if the system uses IP cameras or not, at first. At the same time though, IP has become a real catch phrase for salesman. It reminds me of access control systems. Access control systems that are “hosted in the cloud” have been around for years, only they used to be called “hosted access control”. Now everyone gets excited when they hear the word “cloud” so we’ve had to change our sales pitch. So, even though the end user may not know what IP is (or care), I have to assume… Read more »
“Future proof” is one of the leading hype phrases for IP cameras which, again, lacks technical merit. Why would IP camera-based systems be future proof? “If I have an 8-channel DVR but want to add a ninth (non-IP) camera, then I need a new DVR.” That this is an advantage for IP camera-based systems would be true only if NVRs had infinite camera-count capacity, which is certainly not the case. How about codec chips? The industry is about to transition from H.264 to H.265 compression. Uh oh, that means every IP camera is about to become obsolete! Meanwhile, CCTV and… Read more »
@Todd Rockoff, I think the hype around “the cloud” will die down in time, it is really not suitable for every application. Do you think the hype around IP cameras will ever die down?
Also, it’s interesting you critisize I.T. staff installing their own surveillance systems. In my experience some I.T. people are actually damaging the reputation of IP cameras. I’ve been called in several times, by business owners, requesting we repair or replace the mess that their I.T. people installed.
G’day Colin, You pose an interesting question: Will the hype around IP cameras ever die down? The mega-trend in surveillance is migration to HD. When MP IP cameras were the only way to get HD video, many of us mistook the mega-trend for a migration to IP cameras. Now, a couple of things are happening: IP video is saturating at near 100% market penetration, where everyone doing off-site communications is leveraging IP networks. Meanwhile, the IP camera market, made up of buyers who are immune to price premiums, higher maintenance costs, lower reliability, and who also don’t notice choppy live… Read more »
Very interesting debate guys, it always is when IP/HD/Analogue CCTV systems are involved!! Personally, I am a big fan of Hybrid solutions (groans from the audience …. a fence sitter I hear you say!! I say its realism and giving customers the best deal) which means legacy or even new analogue can work side-by-side with IP and/or HD. Legacy analogue systems are important especially in these frugal times but the main cocern for me is what you want the camera to do, in other words it’s operational requirement. If you have a camera that is simply viewing if a door… Read more »
On the deeper technical aspects of this conversation I’m going to bow out gracefully, but I feel like I can stay in the conversation around hype. Marketing, press machines, even this website, are all part of the hype machine and I hope we don’t over-hype ‘cloud’ solutions or IP solutions, or whatever. We’re here, ultimately, for the security/fire communities to discuss current industry trends, and dealing with the hype is all part of that! Hopefully, once in a while, the hype is well-placed.
I personally don’t see IP as the be all and end all of CCTV. We have some clients who still want analogue systems due to bandwidth, networks and security (this is because they see IP systems as hackable/unsecure). As someone mentioned earlier the live views can also be choppy if the power isn’t there to cope with the system.
Is that a valid concern @Dominic Shepherd? The hackability of IP systems that is. Not someting I’ve heard of first hand, but then I doubt many people who have been compromised share that information publically.
Closed Circuit Television. Is IP Closed? This is a debate we have at our office. maybe a new discussion rather than hijacking this one.
Technically speaking, anything running on IP has the potential of being hacked, surveillance cameras are no different. I have been exploring the hacking risk associated with IP cameras for some time now. Dependent on my findings this may become the topic of a future article.