Airports, rail networks, ports and bus operators increasingly use video to manage day-to-day operations and investigate incidents. As more teams rely on the same footage, operators need to store more data and keep it accessible under more demanding conditions
Airports, rail networks, ports and bus operators increasingly use video to manage day-to-day operations and investigate incidents. As more teams rely on the same footage, operators need to store more data and keep it accessible under more demanding conditions. Worldwide spending on external enterprise storage systems rose 33.7% year over year in the second quarter of 2026, according to IDC. In Asia-Pacific, digitization, cloud adoption and AI are fueling broader infrastructure demand.
Quantum reported that its Asia-Pacific revenue rose more than 50% from the previous quarter in its fiscal first quarter of 2027, which ended June 30, 2026. The company cited strong demand from enterprise and cloud customers. Within the region, Rob Hilligoss, Area Vice-president of APAC Sales and Marketing at Quantum, singles out in this exclusive interview Hong Kong as a bright spot.
What’s driving global storage demand, and what stands out in Asia-Pacific?
Organizations are generating more data and finding more ways to use what they already collect. A camera feed installed for incident review can also help staff see where queues are building or flag a situation that needs attention. In Asia-Pacific, those uses are emerging alongside broader investment in digital infrastructure. Security teams need enough capacity to keep recording as coverage expands and enough performance to make footage available to the people and applications that need it.
What makes transportation a distinct category for storage buyers?
Transport systems operate across terminals, stations, depots and vehicles with very different connectivity and operating conditions. A port may need to bring together footage from several locations to reconstruct an incident. A bus operator may need to retain recordings on a vehicle until it can transfer them. An airport may need to retrieve footage while its busiest cameras keep recording. Where the footage is captured, its resolution (e.g. 4K or 8K), how it moves and how quickly staff need it all shape the storage design.
You’ve highlighted Hong Kong as a bright spot. What does it illustrate for the wider region?
Hong Kong brings several kinds of transport operations into a compact, busy environment. MTR, for example, has described using CCTV analytics to assess crowding at station entrances, ticket gates and platforms. The same principle applies at a ferry terminal or an airport. When staff use video to make decisions in real time, they need dependable access during the busiest periods.
How should operators manage the cost of storing more video?
Decide which footage needs to be available in seconds, which can take longer to retrieve and which has to be preserved for an investigation. Then ask staff to locate and export footage from multiple cameras while recording and analytics continue. Include an older clip that has already moved into the archive. That gives you a practical test of whether your storage choices meet the needs of an incident team.
How can operators keep critical footage accessible if a storage site goes offline?
Genomics England offers an example from outside transportation. It uses Quantum ActiveScale to distribute data and recovery information across three geographically separate data centres. If an entire site goes offline, the system is designed to reconstruct the data from what remains. For transport operators, the same principle can help protect critical footage from a local outage or physical attack. An isolated recovery copy also helps protect against ransomware that reaches multiple sites. Test both sides of the disruption. Can cameras keep recording while a site is offline, and can authorized staff still retrieve and export the footage they need?
(Read
Quantum’s Genomics England case study, and
Quantum’s deployment announcement)
Where do local partners fit into Quantum’s approach to the region?
A transport operator may be upgrading a live network with cameras, software and storage from several suppliers. Local partners can help establish what has to stay running during the change and who takes ownership when a fault spans several systems. Quantum’s expanded distribution model gives regional partners a larger sales and marketing role and retains joint customer support.
(Read
Quantum’s partnership announcement)