IHS estimates the overall growth for the access control industry will be 8.8% in 2015, although that figure is likely to change since this is only the beginning of the year, cautioned Blake Kozak, Senior Analyst at IHS.
IHS estimates the overall growth for the access control industry will be 8.8% in 2015, although that figure is likely to change since this is only the beginning of the year, cautioned Blake Kozak, Senior Analyst at IHS.
Regionally, North America will continue to grow, although not by the same margin as last year. “I do think there will be some shifts in the trend, so this year growth may be a little lower in North America, and higher growth is expected especially in APAC and Latin America,” said Jason Ouellette, Product Line Director for Access Control at Tyco Security Products.
Mike Sussman, Technical Director at TDSi, echoed that comment. “The market is booming internationally, particularly in Africa and Southeast Asia as these markets develop commercially. Even in the U.K., the construction industry's growth is picking up pace after the lull of the late 2000s,” he said. While access control has applications in different sectors, growth is set to be particularly noticeable in certain vertical markets. These include:
Education: Demand in education continues to be strong given school violence and educators' efforts to attract foreign students. “With so many schools, universities, and colleges that have yet to implement holistic access control solutions in their premises, this could be the area of growth for the access control industry this year,” said Norana Johar, COO at FingerTec.
Healthcare: Another area is healthcare, which “continues to see strong growth, especially for electronic locks, to protect patient records, storage closets, drug carts, lockers, among others,” said Kozak.
Residential: Residential security is booming in North America as electronic locks and video are helping to drive the smart home adoption. As for other regions, “although the EMEA and Asia have yet to see this trend, there has been high demand for luxury condos and apartments, especially in parts of Southeast Asia,” Kozak said.
Utilities: Utilities will continue to see strong adoption, especially in many developing countries that are looking to renew their focus on infrastructure development over the next five to 10 years.
SMBs: Demand from small and medium businesses is also growing. “Our belief is in SMBs, which will mainly be driven by two factors,” said Lee Odess, VP of Marketing at Brivo Labs. “First, upfront costs for the system are declining, and second, awareness and demand for the service by this segment are increasing.”