Industry Influencer Q&A: What Successful Security/Audio Partnerships Look Like
Audio enables two-way communication for deterrence, emergency instructions, and security incidents. During a crisis, you can tell people exactly what to do, where to go, or whether to shelter in place, ultimately leading to safer outcomes.
In this Security Influencer Q&A sponsored by AtlasIED, Cameron Javdani, VP of Market Development, explains that for decades, audio was the “third rail” of security. “The industry was dominated by video and access control veterans who’d been using those technologies for 30 years,” he says. “Only in the last few years have they recognized audio as an essential tool.”
Read on to find out why end users and chief security officers have realized that audio has become a core pillar of security’s mission to achieve safer outcomes, why instantaneous communication capability has become indispensable, and how integrators can add it to their offerings.
What are some of the critical factors when selecting an audio system for security?
Javdani: Unlike pro AV, where people debate richness and frequency response, security audio boils down to two things: loudness and intelligibility. Your loudspeakers need to cover the required distance, and people need to understand what’s being said. Everything beyond that? Diminishing returns. You’re not playing Sinatra through a horn on a warehouse wall. Here’s the challenge: Audio is relatively new to the security industry. Video and access control veterans are designing audio systems, but they lack familiarity with acoustic principles. Audio design is fundamentally different from video design.
That’s where our 90-plus years of specializing exclusively in audio come into play. Walk into ISC West, and you’ll see video manufacturers adding audio portfolios, which is great for adoption. But without design expertise, they run into problems: echoing in warehouses, booming in reflective spaces, tinny sound, static.
Environments not traditionally designed for loudspeakers wreak havoc on intelligibility. We help integrators avoid these pitfalls. Most people can install a powerful loudspeaker. The real expertise is ensuring it remains clear and intelligible in challenging acoustic environments. That’s the difference that specialized audio knowledge and AtlasIED make.
What makes a partnership successful in the security industry, particularly with regard to audio?
Effective security systems have multiple components. Most people start with cameras, then add access control to make sure doors lock, and only the right people get in. Then, emergency communication gets incorporated.
Those are three very different technologies with different applications, but they all play core roles in security. That’s where partnerships matter.
You work with people who have genuine subject matter expertise, so the whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts. You wouldn’t call a camera manufacturer to design access control. You wouldn’t call access control vendors for audio systems. But together? That’s when it works.
Great partnerships happen when everyone contributes their specialty, and the end user can leverage all those technologies to achieve their security outcomes. You want relationships where two and two make five, or ten, or fifteen. That multiplier effect comes from working together.
Ultimately, it’s about each partner bringing deep expertise to benefit the end user. That’s what creates real value.
From an integrator’s perspective, what are the key factors when choosing an audio partner?
It’s all about subject matter expertise. Most integrators have been doing video and access control for 30 years, but audio? That’s what their end users are suddenly requesting, and they need to figure it out fast. Integrators want manufacturing partners who provide reliable designs, help them understand the reasoning behind those designs, support customer presentations, and back the product post-installation. That requires deep expertise, which is exactly what AtlasIED brings.
When I talk to security channels about AtlasIED, I tell them: “This technology might be new to you, so here’s what we’ll do. Send your interested end users to our design team. We’ll lay out the entire system, explain our reasoning, and provide the exact bill of materials. Or attend our IPX training. We’ll show you how to install, configure, and support emergency communication systems.”
AtlasIED has been in AV for a long time, but security integrators may not know us. They go to ISC West, not InfoComm. So we’re meeting a new audience and showing them: yes, this is new, but it’s not complicated.
We’ll show you how audio helps your end users accomplish their goals. Because ultimately, it’s all outcome-driven.
What ongoing support and training do integrators need to succeed with audio solutions?
It’s really about what’s new. Once someone understands audio fundamentals — soundwave reflection, reverb, don’t put a mic by an HVAC vent unless you want wind noise — then it’s just about learning new features, functions, and integrations.
It’s similar to video. Once you grasp basic design concepts, you’re looking for new capabilities. Don’t point a camera directly into sunlight unless it has washout prevention. Don’t aim it at a wall when you need a wider field of view to capture the entire room.
With audio, avoid placing mics in a corner near the ceiling because you’ll get reverb that kills intelligibility. Understand the core principles for coverage and clarity, and you’re 90% there.
After that? It’s about additional feature sets. As we release new products with expanded capabilities, we focus our integrator training on how those features help drive end user outcomes.
The fundamentals don’t change much — it’s the possibilities that keep expanding.
How will audio technology evolve in the next three to five years within the security industry?
We’re going to see rapid audio adoption. Security systems will shift from being camera-driven to being audio, control, and communications-driven. Think about it—how many daily facility operations involve information exchange? Cameras are passive observers. Audio sends and receives information. It’ll become a foundational pillar of security design.
That said, the security industry moves notoriously slowly. Left to the industry alone, this would take more than five years. But end users? They’re ready now.
Here’s the thing: End users already live with AV integration. Every Zoom call, every Teams meeting. They’re comfortable with it. The gap isn’t with the users; it’s with the industry status quo.
We need to train integrators, build up their comfort level, and show them how audio drives end-user outcomes.
That’s what accelerates adoption and makes audio the core pillar it should be.
Learn more about AtlasIED at www.atlasied.com.