At a press gathering held at ISC West on Wednesday morning, network surveillance solutions manufacturer Axis Communications discussed its plans to "simplify IP" technology for the large analog segment of the video surveillance market.
At last year's ISC West show, Axis General Manager Fredrik Nilsson said that the company focused on the number 15, which represented the number of years since the company invented the IP camera. This year, Nilsson said that company wanted to focus on two numbers, which were four and 70.
The number four represents Axis' new ARTPEC-4 camera chip, which offers increased image quality, more efficient H.264 compression and enhanced processing power, which will improve video analytic capabilities for the company's cameras. The chip is also an enabler of Axis' Lightfinder technology, which allows an IP camera to see colors and detail clearly in dark and low-light conditions.
Nilsson said that the other number, 70, represents the percentage of the market that it still composed of analog installations.
"Analog is still the dominant part of the market," he told the gathering of media members and company officials.
While a lot of installations with more than 16 cameras have made the transition to IP, Nilsson said many with fewer cameras have not made the migration for a myriad of reasons including perceived cost and ease-of-use advantages.
With this in mind, Nilsson said that the company set out to develop a solution that would address these perceived benefits, as well as be simple to install, thereby providing analog users with an easy and affordable migration path. The end result of this effort is the company's new Axis Camera Companion, an all-in-one, intuitive IP solution that consists of a free software client for one to16 Axis network cameras or video encoders.
The camera companion runs entirely on the inside of the camera or encoder with the software client only being needed to monitor and record video. Video can also be stored on SD cards inside the cameras, which Nilsson said is capable of retaining a couple of days' worth of footage.
"The engineers redefined the paradigm," Nilsson said. "The camera is now the recorder."
