Per Mar hosted video storage grows

DAVENPORT, Iowa—About two years after launching its hosted video storage offering, sales are steady, Brad Tolliver, VP of Per Mar's Electronic Security Division, told Security Systems News.

Per Mar changed the format a bit for its hosted video storage accounts, which brought down its creation multiple for these accounts. “We can go in with a lower install cost and get some nice RMR,” he said.

A full-service super-regional with a UL-listed central station, Per Mar does business here and in four neighboring states and has north of 35,000 customers. Importantly, it had the infrastructure and in-house IT expertise to launch a hosted video storage offering, Tolliver said.

In addition, many of its customers fall into the “sweet spot for this offering, four-to-eight camera environments … where it's not optimal to go with a traditional NVR or DVR,” he said.

Tolliver said the company has had success going back to customers who fit that niche and offering them the services.

“Especially people who fit that size that have traditional DVRs. We go back with this offering and we can convert their analog cameras to an IP format using Axis encoders. Those encoders are nice because they also have on-site storage, [which provides redundancy] in case there's an interruption with the network.”

This summer, executives at the super-regional are talking about a Per Mar multi-function mobile app for end users.

Tolliver said a Per Mar app that can interface with the central station—for billing and video, for example—is a topic of great interest and discussion at this point, but the actual development is a ways off. “On the back side it would have to interface with a variety of manufacturers and software providers. It's a complex process,” Tolliver said.