Today, the video surveillance industry is clearly a front-runner in the enterprise space, expected to grow to $42.81 billion by 2019, at a CAGR of 19.1% (Source: Transparency Market Research). The aim is to prevent crime, trespassing and other antisocial activities. With numerous worldwide terrorist attacks making the news in recent times, there’s been a greater focus by governments, municipalities and facility owners to raise the standard of their security and surveillance systems to tackle emerging threat scenarios. All the same, there’s a repetitive call to design these systems to be minimally invasive, so as not to intrude on anyone’s privacy and comfort.

There are several products and solutions in the market today extensively being used by airports, enterprises, commercial establishments, public transit systems, law enforcement agencies and government institutions as well as homeowners, to monitor and manage the security of their establishments. Camera-based video surveillance equipment sits at the heart of round-the-clock security.

The Need for Video Management Systems (VMS)

Managing the security of any establishment is a tough task. Although there are numerous surveillance devices that make the job sound easy, for security professionals monitoring the devices, the task is repetitive and cumbersome. Due to the nature of their job, they suffer from fatigue which renders the technical capabilities of the camera, ineffective. And while security professionals can monitor a small number of live feeds simultaneously, they are compelled to manually scan the recorded video in case of an event, making the entire process of surveillance time-consuming and ineffective.

This is where video management systems (VMS) come into play, as they bring in intelligence and at the same time, being adaptable and interoperable with other systems. VMS connects and integrates with safety alarm systems to generate alerts, and notifications which helps in providing actionable data points to aid in decision-making. The analytics algorithms generate alerts in real-time, which help in reducing the monotony and fatigue of security staff.

Additionally, they give multi-camera, continuous, and trigger–based feeds which can be viewed on the premise as well as remotely. They also have an in-built storage and analytics capabilities in parallel to finish recording.

Advanced Technological Capabilities

Today’s VMS devices have high-resolution IP surveillance cameras ideal for large system integrators which can be custom-built to meet unique deployment requirements; they work just as well on a stand-alone system for a small retail outlet, and as an enterprise platform for a large multinational warehouse. Let’s look at some of the capabilities of VMS:

High Performance

• VMS allows the automation of security actions and control external systems, reducing the amount of manual tasks
• They often include features such as motion detection, bandwidth adjustable remote viewing, camera mapping and local/remote collaborative video investigation
• Due to the underlying architecture and technology, and the presence of failover servers, they ensure reliable, and uninterrupted video recording
• They have the ability to quickly respond to events

Central Management

• Centralized management gives users the option of managing multiple geographically dispersed sites from one central location, saving time and operational costs
• The availability of a wide range of administration tools makes the initial configuration, and daily administration of large systems deployed across different geographical locations easily

 Real-Time Capture

• Situational awareness tools offer accurate, real-time overview of activities
• In restricted areas and during non-operational hours, when a motion is detected, alerts are generated
• Alarm manager feature enables quick and immediate investigation of incidents
• Interactive maps offer comprehensive visual overview of cameras and layouts
• Custom dashboards provide a detailed insights into events to ensure optimal safety
• Navigation feature makes navigating complex locations easy, allowing users to efficiently track moving objects

Third Party Integration

• VMS supports a range of third-party integrations
• They seamlessly work with a variety of other systems: Point-of-Sale systems, gaming consoles, traffic signals, access control systems, parking management systems, printers, barcode scanners and warehouse management systems, to name a few.

 Video Integrity

• Users can retain months of video footage with the long-term video storage option
• Videos are exported in the same format as the recording, that makes it possible for operators to view footage on standard video players
• Exported video footage is generally encrypted and tamper-proofed to ensure admissibility

Video management systems are steering the surveillance camera industry in a new direction. With their easy and intuitive user interface, quick and simplified setup and administration, and scalability features, they are ideal solution to meet the needs of efficient surveillance requirements of institutions worldwide, offering round-the-clock security to help monitor spaces and curb acts of crime.

Putting the pieces together

There are multitude of building blocks and technical considerations useful in setting up a perfect VMS solution for particular needs.

It is really important to get the combination right in terms of:

• Architecture:
  • Federated
  • Distributed
• Servers:
  • On premise streaming server
  • Camera integrator server
  • Remote / on premise servers for data storage
  • Analytics server
• Bandwidth considerations and hence communication protocols
• Supported devices and hence respective browsers
• Loss-making vs. Lossless streaming based on the requirement

It takes an all-round expert to weave a perfect VMS solution by maximizing the benefits from variety of options available subject to constraints of resources in terms of resolutions, bandwidth, cost, communication, and desired features to reap the maximum benefits out of this explosively growing technology.

eInfochips, a leader in product design services, offers its own fully-customizable white-box surveillance Video Management Software (VMS). We enable customized, application-specific VMS IPs that are owned by our customers. In addition to complete flexibility on product features, our VMS solution provides a customized and economical alternative to expensive licensing for VMS applications. It also provides a platform for an industry or application specific VMS intellectual property as a client-branded solution. To know more, drop us an email at marketing@einfochips.com