Hikvision, Dahua clinch top spots on Security 50 this year

We at a&s proudly present the Security 50 Ranking and Reports for 2018, in which the a&s Editorial Team ranks publicly-listed companies with strong global presence in the security industry based on their physical security product sales revenue for 2017.

Looking at this year’s Security 50 rankings, one can’t help but notice that the top two spots now go to Hikvision Digital Technology and Dahua Technology, the latter jumped from No. 3 last year to No. 2 this year. This has all but solidified the status of the two Chinese companies (often collectively referred to as Hikua in the security world) as the world’s biggest security firms. Hikvision remained the world’s No. 1 with 2017 security product sales revenue of US$5.4 billion, a growth of 26.4 percent from 2016. Dahua, meanwhile, saw 2017 revenue of $2.7 billion, a growth of 41.4 percent from the previous year.

As for the other top ten companies, things were pretty much the same from 2017, with the established brands – ASSA ABLOY, Bosch Security Systems, Axis Communication, FLIR Systems, Allegion and Hanwha Techwin ranking No. 3 to 8, respectively, and Avigilon moving up from last year’s No. 12 to this year’s No. 10. Tiandy Technologies took the No. 9 spot.
 

Top revenue gainers

 
In terms of ranking by revenue growth, Chinese companies last year took the top five spots. This year Chinese companies were more spread apart within the top 15, with Raysharp, Dahua, Tiandy, Kedacom and Hikvision taking No. 1, 3, 4, 6 and 8, respectively. Raysharp, which made its debut on Security 50 this year and ranks No. 18 on the main list, saw revenue jumping 71.3 percent, taking No. 1 in terms of revenue growth. Last year’s top gainer, Wanjiaan Interconnected Technology, got pushed out of the top 15 this year.
 
Asian companies, meanwhile, still dominated the top 15 revenue gainers. Besides the aforementioned five Chinese companies, other Asian entrants include CP Plus, ITX Security, KOCOM, INCOM and VIVOTEK. Among Western companies, Russia’s DSSL, a new entrant to Security 50, took the No. 2 spot in term of growth, with revenue increase of 48.2 percent. Milestone Systems and Axis, meanwhile, took No. 10 and No. 12, respectively.
 

Most profitable

 
In terms of gross profit, Hikvision and Axis took the top spots, with 2017 gross profit of $1.4 billion and $501 million, respectively. Interestingly, certain companies that registered revenue declines in 2017 were nonetheless quite profitable, demonstrating their cost-down strategy has worked. These include Fermax, Hanwha Techwin and IDIS, which had 2017 revenue declines of -3.1 percent, -9 percent and -12.2 percent in comparison to 2016. Yet in terms of gross profit, they registered $34.7 million, $215 million and $24.2 million, respectively, ranking No. 9, 4 and 15.
 
As for companies with the highest gross profit margins, the top 5 were VIVOTEK, Fermax, IndigoVision, Axis and Avigilon. The top five companies with the highest net profit were Hikvision, Dahua, Axis, Fermax and Nedap.
 
“We collaborate with upstream manufacturers as we see fit to ensure that our products maintain a market leading position and move in the right direction. Take lenses, for example. We collaborate with the most suitable suppliers that match our products. From a supply chain perspective, we can select from different providers. This results in end products with better performance at a proper cost level. This is one way how we control cost and improve our profitability,” said Keen Yao, VP of International Business Center at Hikvision Digital Technology.

With advanced analytics, a lot of which are being marketed under the moniker “artificial intelligence” or AI, gaining more market acceptance, most of the Security 50 companies are moving towards that direction as well, offering smart solutions that help users across verticals.

According to Dahua, by offering cognitive analytics the company enables a broader range of applications such as smart retail, intelligent traffic management and smart parking to assist in generating greater profits and efficiency for security professionals For example, in order to improve municipal operations and make cities more intelligent, Dahua recently launched the Heart of City (HOC) initiative.
 
“The ‘HOC’ is a smart city development engine supported by full sensing, full intelligence, full computing and full ecosystem capabilities. It realizes the construction of a ‘1 platform, 2 centers, N applications’ smart city framework for application at the city, industry and commercial level,” said Fu Liquan, Chairman of Dahua Technology. “Dahua Technology is now perfectly equipped with the capabilities of top-level planning and detailed designing for smart cities.”
 
Overall, it’s clear that the current momentum seen in the global security market is unlike to stop in the short-term. More and more users are applying security to both security and non-security operations. The use of advanced analytics and AI to allow users to become more proactive and efficient has taken root and is expected to blossom in the years to come. All this, coupled with strong economic performance in different regions, is expected to influence security positively in the years to come.