What are they doing right?

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.—Central station automation platform provider Bold Technologies in March announced it had experienced its largest increase in growth during the past ten years with a recession-defying 45 percent growth rate in 2010.

In a year that was financially difficult for many, what did the company do right?

The key to Bold's success, according to company president Rod Coles, is an unwavering focus on people—both customers and staff.

“Probably the most important thing we've been doing is focusing on the existing customers. If you look at any type of classical recession economy, you have to focus on what you have first. You've got to keep your customers happy,” Coles told Security Systems News. “You really have to work at it. It's also very important if you want to grow and do well to look after your staff. We continue to look after them and keep the employees as a key part of what we do. They're just as important as the customers.”

Coles also said the Manitou platform, with new features and planned additions, remains an invaluable tool for its central station clients.

“We've announced BoldTrack which is our GPS module. We'll fully release it this year. The other thing we did is mobile apps… We demonstrated our mobile apps—particularly for the Android—last year. One of our big new products is the Mediagateway—which won a Maximum Impact Award,” Coles said, noting MediaGateway integrates different media including telephony, voice, SMS technology, and data. “We try and give our customers tools rather than a single solution. Our customers have great imaginations and they can see all these possibilities, and we want to give them the tools to build whatever they can imagine.”

Coles said MediaGateway provides significantly increased efficiencies and revenue-generating opportunities for both central stations and alarm dealers.

“One of the big things we've done since the early days is we wanted one point of control, so we integrate with lots of different devices and technologies so you can have one user experience. If I have a Honeywell camera or a March Networks camera, from an operator point of view, it doesn't matter.”