IMS Research: US ALPR Market to Bounce Back

While suppliers of automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) in the U.K. endure a stagnant market and budget cuts, growth opportunities in the U.S. continue to ramp up. In its latest ALPR market research IMS Research focuses on the key factors driving growth within this thus far, untapped market.

The U.K. is and will remain the home of ALPR; however the EMEA region is not set to recover to pre-2009 growth rates until after 2014. Seeking new growth opportunities, suppliers need look no further than the U.S. Worth an estimated US$68.0 million in 2010, the US ALPR market is forecast to more than double in size over the next five years on the back of national congestion initiatives, a move to fixed ALPR systems, and intelligent policing where ALPR is being combined with intelligence to provide a toolset able to detect and investigate serious and complex crime.

With no common budget available for the purchase of ALPR, and the majority of decisions being made on a state-by-state basis it is easy to see why so many have procrastinated, not knowing where to begin. “Worry not”, said Paul Everett, Research Director. “The U.S. continues to invest in ALPR technology for security and law enforcement and there are a plethora of budgets available. What's more, with more than 40,000 separate police forces and over half a million vehicles, the US law enforcement sector offers exceptional growth opportunities for suppliers of ALPR technology”

“In previous years, ALPR projects in the U.S. were typically small and sporadic. The market also saw a slowdown in new projects during 2008 and 2009 with many put on hold. However, they are starting to come back. Not only that, the market is also slowly beginning to see projects of a much larger size,” Everett said.