How I Use My System: Rick Simpson

Rick Simpson, vice president technical services of Vector Security, has been with the company for 33 years. He “started as a service technician, then moved up through the ranks.” Simpson is a past chair of the ESA Standards Fire/Life Safety Committee. Security Systems News talked with Simpson in August about the security system he uses at home.

What kind of system do you have?

I currently have a Concord 4 [from Interlogix], and we have a full perimeter system. So, all of the doors are protected and then, internally, we have motion detectors. [I also have] a full fire alarm system that's connected to the Concord.

Why this particular setup?

We installed it when the house was built, so, it's about 11 years ago. At the time, it was our go-to product; it was our main product that we used at Vector in 2005/2006. … It's performed well, and then obviously we have interactive services through Alarm.com. That provides us both communications outside of the house and then to the central station. At the same time, it also controls our home automation.

What is one aspect of your security system that you wouldn't want to live without?

Besides security, I think that the integration between security and automation is absolutely critical; the idea that they both work in constant communications with each other, and the flexibility to allow us to make changes. … The capabilities of the interactive services between security and automation is probably the one thing that I think is so valuable today.

Where do you see security going next? What are some big trends?

I think the continual evolution of blending security with automation and then, on top of that, … the development of artificial intelligence [is a big trend]. The ability of the system to better understand how that user interacts, to take some of that thinking away, where the artificial intelligence would do something.