Martha's daily report from the ISC West show floor

Updated April 3, 2014, with information about ISC West Day 2

Day two started with the fifth annual Security 5K, a benefit race for the wonderful organization, Mission 500. More than 700 people registered for the race and we raised $90,000 to help save lives.

We had a very special guest at the Security 5K events this year, someone who knows well the good work of Mission 500. Before the race, and also at the Security 5K race reception we heard from Dr. Diego Alejandro Garcia, a pediatrician who was sponsored at the age of 3 through World Vision/Mission 500.

Today he is Director of the Colombian Ministry of Health Vaccination Program..

He spoke about his experience with Mission 500 and what a real impact it has on young children.

I don't think I was the only one in the crowd who found Diego's remarks—and presence at the even this year—very moving

The Security 5k was founded by United Publications, publishers of Security Systems News and Security Director News, and we're the organizing sponsor of the event. Other sponsors are Reed Exhibitions, proprietors of ISC Expos; and Mission 500. Core sponsors of the 2014 Mission 500 5K/2K are Alarm.com, Altronix Corporation, Axis Communications, Ditek, HID Global, Honeywell, LRG Marketing Communications, Pelco by Schneider Electric, and Safety Technology International. Additional sponsors include Cops Monitoring, Digital Monitoring Products (DMP), Samsung, Brivo, Freeman, Monitronics, Qolsys, Bolide Technology Group, Security Industry Association, and PSA Security Network.

Find out more about this wonderful organization here. http://mission500.org/2014/

After the race I had 30 minutes to get back to the show floor where I got to participate (with Mission 500's George Fletcher, Diego Garcia, Charlene Foglio) in the opening ceremony for ISC West Day 2.

Then the meetings started. Here's a brief overview of who I saw:

I met with Jay Hauhn of TycoIS and we talked about the hosted video cloud service that TycoIS is planning to launch in June. TycoIS is working with Next Level Security Systems on project. I asked Jay how he feels about ADT getting into larger commercial security projects (greater than 7,500 square feet after its non-compete with TycoIS expires in September.) “Just another competitor,” Hauhn said.

John Romanowich of Sightlogix filled me in on the company's newest camera—it's faster, more accurate and the price has come way down. He said it “brings accurate outdoor security to the mass market.” And because the power requirements are so low, it can be wireless and run on solar. He noted that it's the trenching for wiring that costs money and necessitates design work.

Steve Gorski of MOBOTIX said he's talking to lots of integrators about the company's new VMS software, which he called “user-friendly, icon-driven, Apple-ish.”

At Speco Technologies, Laura Mastroberti and Jim Pascale showed me the new IP version of Speco's mini-cams. I also saw their a recreation of their H2H training center they have in their booth this year.

I spoke to Pierre Racz Genetec. They're showing Bosch's 4K camera and he called Genetec's collaboration with Bosch on the 4k cameras proof that "the best of breed is the way to go"

Had an interesting chat with Brian Schmode at Avigilon. We were talking about how much work the company does with IT resellers. He said it's the end user that drives which reseller Avigilon uses, and said the company is definitely seeing more end users working with IT resellers.

Off the show floor I caught up with Marty Guay and Paul Barratta at the Stanley Security suite. We talked about the new version of Stanley's eSuite customer portal.

Updated April 2, too late at night

It's 10 p.m. and ISCW2014 Day 1 (Wednesday, April 2) is a wrap! Good day on and off the show floor.

No numbers yet from Reed Exhibitions, but it was crowded today. I heard from several exhibitors that they saw more people in the first half of today than they normally see in two days. I even heard that from one access control provider who is located in the more far flung reaches of the hall.

I started the day at the Axis Communications breakfast. I don't really love events before the event, but the Axis breakfast/press conference proves to be worthwhile year after year. The theme this year was 4. Yup, you guessed it, Axis introduced its 4k line, the P14 Series. Fredrik Nilsson Axis GM Americas touted the P14 28E. It's better, he said, because: it follows the ITU standard (4k res in 30 fps); it's easy to install; the lens fits the solution 'perfectly' (IR corrected 8MP lens0; correct depth of field and image clarity; and , it's $999 and “ready for outdoors.”

Axis folks talked about other “4s” as well. After asking if� people would be running the annual Security 5K race tomorrow, Nilsson said: “some of us will wish it's a 4k tomorrow.”

Axis co-founder Martin Gren gave a brief (and really amusing) history of Axis and the company's “culture of innovation.” He noted that 2014 is the 30th anniversary of Axis, and mentioned that the original name of the company was G&K Firmware. “Isn't that a cool name?” he said.

We saw a demo of the P14 28E. Cool, clear picture. And we also saw a demo of Axis' (4th generation) camera station.

Next up, was the BRS Labs press conference, where Ray Davis spoke about the company's new Saas solution. This means that BRS Labs is bringing “the same technology that the US military, several cities and some countries” use to commercial customers. The company wants its customers to include not only the “Googles, Amazons and FedExes” but small and medium size businesses. It also has its eye on the residential market.

Davis called the offering a “pre-crime systems” that is better than an alert or alarm that only goes off once a criminal is on premises.

BRS Labs will be making a concerted effort to woo integrators, dealers and residential installers and will launch a full channel partner program this summer.

At Pivot3, Ron Nash spoke about VSTAC edge product “a first class solutions for a customer with multiple locations” and how the company's VDI product line can help make mobile access secure.

Scan Source has a brand new booth, dedicated to its new “security on demand,” an educational and information portal that the distribution company launched today. For all current and (for a time)prospective clients, the portal features short videos with content that's relevant to resellers.

I spoke to Joe Morgan at FLIR was the company's new low cost thermal bullet camera ($499) which the company expects to “open doors to more vertical markets.”

Most of the afternoon was spent at the SSN Media studio doing video interviews with readers. I spoke to:

Joe Liguori, partner at ACT, an integration company (and Security-Net member) based in New Jersey. Ligouri is planning to grow his company from about a $13m to $20m in revenue over the next few years. He talked about the training-intensive culture at ACT and how that's necessary to customer service, internal efficiency, and also to the planned rapid growth the company is looking for.

So, one of my favorite activities at ISC West is generally HID's Denis Hebert's lunchtime trends talk. He generally draws a great crowd and generates some good discussion. Well, HID had alternate plans this year, but Hebert agreed to come talk to ssnTVnews about trends. The most important, this year, he said, is convergence and secured identity solutions. We talked about HID's decision to leverage Bluetooth LE (in addition to NFC) with its mobile solutions. Finally he talked about the complexity of solutions for integrators—and what HID is doing to help its integrator partners with sales and education.

Holly Tsourides, CEO of Matrix Systems, talked about the integration arm of Matrix, “Xentry.” She believes the newly named business unit has great potential to increase the services it sells to existing customers and to bring on new customers.

G4S Technology president Sam Belbina talked about providing the “total solution” to customers and how G4S is in a unique position to do just that because its sister companies offer monitoring and guard solutions.

Eric Yunag, CEO of Dakota Security, talked about what he's seeing on and what he's not seeing on the show floor. Incremental technology feature improvements he sees a lot of. That can be interesting, he said, but what he wants to see from manufacturers is the showcasing of security outcomes. He also talked about his frustration with standards and how this industry needs to feel a little more urgency about standards. IT companies—“have the potential to exert a technical advantage � and exploit a significant weakness [of security companies], he said, unless this industry gets up to speed on standards.

I talked some more on this topic with Brent Franklin, president of Unlimited Technology. IT companies have their eye on the security space, he said. All integration companies need to understand that, he said. We also talked about Franklin's plans to grow Unlimited Technology's revenues 30 percent in 2014. It added 15 staff in 2013 and plans to add 16 this year.

At the Brivo Labs press conference Lee Odess talked about the company's launch of its SAM API (social access management), which allows developers to create applications that allow people to use their social identities for access control to places and identities. He also demo'ed OKDoor which allows a person to use their social media identity to send a message when they arrive at a destination.

Among the receptions I attended tonight: DVTel, alarm.com, Affiliated Monitoring, Samsung, and my personal favorite Women's Security Council. The WSC threw another great event to honor the 2014 Women of the Year. Read about that here.

updated March 31, 2014

It snowing and sleeting here in Maine as I try to get out the door to leave for the desert, and of course, there's also news breaking.

Video surveillance providers Vicon and IQinVision announced this morning that they're merging into what will be a $56 million company. Read details here.�

Also, NMC announced it's opening a new $6 million location. Check out the details here.�

Check back for news from the ISC West show floor. Leif, Tess, Amy and I will all be updating our blogs daily. On Tuesday, I'll be attending some meetings in the afternoon, stopping by the SIA event, the Security-Net event and a Diebold event as well.

On Wednesday morning, I go to the Axis breakfast. I go every year, and every year, so far anyway, it's informative and entertaining. I'm expecting the same this year.

After that, I'm heading to our Meet the Editors event. Tess, Amy, Leif and I will be at the SSN booth/ISC West Media Studio from 9:30 to 10. It's right outside the entrance to the show floor. You can't miss it. Please stop by and introduce yourself.

Also, remember to tweet using the #ISCW14 hashtag. You can see all the relevant tweets at the Security Systems News Twitter Wall, located just inside the entrance to the show floor. We'll be awarding an iPad Mini at 12:30 on Friday, April 4 to the MVT the Most Valuable Tweeter. To be a competitive MVT candidate, be informative and compelling and use the� #ISCW14 hashtag.

See you in Las Vegas!