Humphrey, who joined Dedicated Micros in March 1998 as managing director of the UK/European subsidiary, was promoted at the end of last year to the position of group managing director, having held the post of acting group managing director since February.
As head of Dedicated Micros, which built its reputation on the back of its multiplexers for the CCTV industry, he controversially suggests that, because of the digital revolution, the multiplexer is doomed — eventually.
Information technology and CCTV are merging, he says. While this is not a controversial position — experts have been suggesting it for years — he believes the advent of digital technology will render video multiplexers redundant. "Do you need a multiplexer with digital?" he asks.
For a company that has built its CCTV products on the back of multiplexers this may seem a controversial, nay even dangerous, thought to think, but he wants to make the point that Dedicated Micros is staying ahead of the development curve, wherever that might lead.
Digital CCTV is, of course, being driven by the revolution in the IT industry. The CCTV industry is borrowing the faster communications technology, being developed for the IT industry, and turning it to the advantage of security professionals. As communications bandwidth increases exponentially, it is becoming increasingly feasible to transmit real-time digital video.
Digital storage is also going through a revolution, as new media such as DVD are introduced, and mainstays like hard-disks are improved.
This has raised the potential of having a system that is more reliable than analogue. Analogue, of course, suffers from the problems of variability. A well-specified, installed analogue system will, Humphrey concedes, outperform a digital system, using current technology, but analogue degrades over time in a way that digital will not: "With digital, you are removing the variability," he says.
With that increase in the ability to transmit and store digital images comes the need to be able to view and retrieve those images, as the security industry has been doing with analogue for years.
Digital products
Under development are a range of new digital devices, which will ensure that as CCTV operators make the switch to digital, DM will be there with the goods. New products include Digital Sprite Lite and Vserver, a digital video server which can handle 16 camera inputs under control from a desktop PC.
So, how long until analogue dies? Humphrey isn't ready to write the epitaph yet. Despite his enthusiasm for digital CCTV, he insists that analogue will continue to be specified for years to come. DM continues to develop and refine its existing analogue products because, says Humphrey, every market has its technologically conservative element.
Digital is at the stage where it's popular in the main with the so-called "early adopters", those elements of the market who are at the "bleeding edge" (sic). This is the leading edge of the development curve, populated by those individuals who don't mind taking a risk with new technology if it might yield even a marginal increase in performance.
Meanwhile, at the lower end of the market, he predicts that more CCTV users will upgrade from video switchers to multiplexers, as the market becomes that little bit more sophisticated. Says Humphrey, "I feel that people are shifting from quads to multiplexers. As people become more familiar with CCTV, the market is definitely getting more educated. They want it to do more, and the cost of more sophisticated devices is falling." Multiplexers are becoming more user-friendly, too. With its in-house design facility, DM continues to upgrade its Sprite Lite range, adding features such as an auto camera-detect function and "trimming off" some less popular functions to bring the cost down.
Although the units are assembled in Malta, new units are designed at DM's headquarters in Manchester. It's here that new features are added, unpopular features deleted... and — in its position near the heart of the world's leading CCTV market — Dedicated Micros does its best to keep its finger on the pulse of the world-wide CCTV industry.
Exports galore
Sales of DM CCTV control equipment total just over £20 million a year. Of this, the UK accounts for about a third, or around 35%-36%. The balance is made up of exports to Europe, North America and Asia. Despite the strength of the pound hurting UK exports, as well as encouraging more imports, Humphrey believes that the UK leads Europe and the rest of the world in CCTV. This puts British CCTV companies, including Dedicated Micros, in a stronger position with regard to exports. Europe, for years lagging behind the UK in the development of CCTV, is beginning to catch up, and demand for CCTV control equipment is growing. Sales to Europe are currently running at 20 – 25% of DM’s sales. And he reveals, combined with price reductions for control equipment in the region of 20 – 30%, this has led to a 30% or more increase in demand in Europe. Meanwhile, sales in North America account for some 30% of DM’s CCTV control equipment turnover, and says Humphrey, “It is growing significantly”. Meanwhile, the Asian market continues to be rocky. Accounting for some 10 – 15% of DM’s sales, the Asian market “was growing rapidly, declined rapidly, but is now coming back strongly”, says Humphrey.Source
Security Installer
