NextAlarm heads south of the border with a new partnership

OJAI, Calif.--NextAlarm announced yesterday that it is making its first foray into Latin America by partnering with Megacable Communications and IP Monitor, an alarm systems company, both of which provide services in and around Guadalajara, Mexico. Together, the three companies will be offering the first bundled broadband services package in that area, which will include alarm monitoring as well as cable TV, Internet and phone service. Alarm monitoring became available to subscribers on July 1. "Megacable is the cable provider in Guadalajara and one of the largest in Mexico," said Alex Elliot, president and chief executive officer of NextAlarm. "IP Monitor is an alarm provider in Guadalajara and surrounding cities. We have teamed up with both companies to use our patented ABN technology." NextAlarm will use its Alarm Broadband Network adapters that will allow IP Monitor to communicate with the Megacable subscribers' alarm systems over broadband. "We've installed servers in IP Monitor's central station and they're providing the service to Megacable's customers." Elliot added that Megacable is handling much of the marketing for the package, including running TV spots on their cable station. Elliot said that many customers in that region of Mexico are getting cable before they have landline telephones. "There's a growing group of customers there that have cable and VoIP who are using a slice of the cable bandwidth even though the customer does not use the Internet at present. In the U.S., the customer buys cable and we piggyback VoIP onto it. But in Guadalajara, [most of Megacable's customers] do not have computers--the wire lines are not good down there, so these guys are running fiber faster than copper can be run for landlines... Cable and fiber are really leapfrogging over copper." According to Elliot, as a result, customers are signing up for cable service to use entertaiment and phone services, as "this market segment has no need for Internet yet as they do not have computers." This allows Megacable to generate additional revenue by monitoring the alarm system over the broadband connection at less cost to the customer than conventional Internet service. "As far as we know, we're the first to do this--this alliance is the first," said Elliot. In addition to teaming up with Megacable and IP Monitor, "There are two more partnerships currently under discussion in Latin America," said Elliot. For more on this story, see the September issue of Security Systems News.