Ipsotek, the UK-based solution provider of advanced scenario based video analytics for a wide range of security and operational applications in commercial and public sectors will be strengthening its Asian operations by moving into a larger office in Singapore. As part of this, the company aims to double in manpower in
Ipsotek, the UK-based solution provider of advanced scenario based video analytics for a wide range of security and operational applications in commercial and public sectors will be strengthening its Asian operations by moving into a larger office in Singapore. As part of this, the company aims to double in manpower in Singapore over the next three months.
The company first entered the Asian market with an office in Singapore in 2013 and since then has been expanding its presence in the region. Speaking to asmag.com, David Howarth, GM for APAC region at Ipsotek gave insights into the company's strategies and plans for SE Asia.
“At the moment, it's quite a wide ranging market, with the obvious frustration that sometimes comes from introducing a new technology into a new region, but as a whole it's an excellent opportunity for Ipsotek as there is a real need for the type of advanced solutions that we provide,” Howarth said. “It's an emerging requirement as far as analytics is concerned, whereas in the European and Middle East market, analytics have been widely deployed for a number of years.”
In fact, in Asia, it has been a lot about educating the customer about what advanced analytics can and cannot do and how beneficial it can be to the end users' business and operations. The problem, according to Howarth, is that when analytics initially took off, a lot of vendor companies had overpromised, and consequently there were situations where customers got their fingers burned.
“One of my challenges has been in explaining why our solution is so very different to what the customer may have experienced before. However, I've been well supported by our early achievements here, and also the large fully deployed projects that we have in other regions, such as the U.K., Europe and the Middle East – it's always easier to grow in a new market if you are already a proven technology elsewhere.”
Asia being a very different market from the West, Ipsotek has specific marketing strategies that it is applying in the continent. Howarth said that the company has been very proactive in participating in security industry trade shows, attending up to seven or eight trade shows in the APAC region every year. These can be small, regional shows where the company is supported by its partners or can also be national ones.
“We invest in our partners,” Howarth said, giving an example of an instance when they took their distributors and system integrators to the U.K., put them up in a hotel for two weeks and gave them extensive training. Efforts such as this have been an excellent way to invest in the region, he said.
Countries that are the main focus for the company in the region include Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia. In fact, Ipsotek's first major projects in SE Asia were in Thailand and Indonesia.
Moving forward, this year, the company aims to consolidate and build an even larger team in Singapore that can then become the major regional support center for the wider APAC region.