PATH TO GROWTH

Ten years ago, there was limited demand for megapixel network cameras.  Yet, IQinVision’s founders were confident in the long-term market value and viability of this class of network-capable camera products.  Over the ensuing years, the company managed the business conservatively, which directly resulted in its current unique and attractive position.

IQinVision is now a mature, profitable company with an established product line in a very young, fast-growing market.  IQinVision’s long-term experience has enabled it to identify market demand and respond with highly valuable, differentiated features like on-camera recording and analytics, digital image cropping, multi-stream virtual camera functionality, digital pan/tilt/zoom and on-camera image authentication.  Today, these unique features enable its distributor and integrator partners to distance themselves from commodity, standard resolution cameras and reap the attractive gross profit margins that come from such differentiation.  Overall, its focus, patience, and diligent cost-controls during the lean years empowered it to deliver the broad, feature-rich and mature IQeye product line it offers today.

R&D CENTER AND OVERSEA BRANCHES

IQinVision currently has approximately 65 employees in the U.S. and Europe and continues to grow staff at a sustained pace.  Corporate headquarters are located in San Juan Capistrano, CA, the U.S., with additional offices in Lancaster, PA, the U.S., and Utrecht, Netherlands.  It has a dedicated sales team serving the U.S., and EMEA with supporting staff in sales and marketing.  The company’s development team has extensive experience in networking and image processing and its manufacturing operations are scalable to respond quickly to changes in market demand.

BUSINESS MODELS

One of IQinVision’s guiding principles, which has fueled success in its target markets to date, is to continually introduce highly differentiated, market-valuable products and services.  The company spends a great deal of time understanding the needs of the markets it targets, and it makes sure its products and services directly meet its customers’ specific needs.  IQinVision has watched many companies come and go in industry space over the years, and it expects to see more of the same.  These companies failed to recognize that megapixel technology is not a “cookie cutter” business where products are developed simply by procuring a chip-set and combining it with a camera housing and a lens.

POTENTIAL SUCCESS POINT

Over the last decade, IQinVision has perfected its product line through real-world deployments and partner cooperation, creating for the company and its partners a set of compelling competitive advantages that have been validated by the marketplace.  Its IQeye line of megapixel network cameras have the industry’s most stable platform, operating continuously in challenging network environments without interruption for years, and delivering the highest quality images available today.

But it hasn’t all been about products.  It also recognized that megapixel network cameras were a new breed of product and having the best product wasn’t going to be enough.  So, it built a world-class customer service and technical support organization run by dedicated professionals with whom it is a pleasure to do business.  Its charter is to continually exceed its customers’ expectations every time.

With its long-term experience, IQinVision has now become the mature, profitable company with an established product line in this young and fast-growing IP camera market.  In this interview with Amanda Kim, Editor of SecurityWorld INT’L, Pete DeAngelis, CEO of IQinVision, talks about how the company has been able to differentiate itself from its competitors.

Please start by telling us a little about your business background.

I am what you could call a “serial entrepreneur”.  Throughout my career, I have been involved mainly with small- to medium-size companies.  In the early 1980s, I started my first company, PC Devices, which was formed to take advantage of what was then a young technology of audio for personal computers. 

In the mid 1990s, I co-founded Rokenbok Toy Company based out of San Diego, California, the U.S., where I was fortunate enough to help the company grow from US$300,000 in its 1st year to over US$10 million dollars in the company’s 3rd year.  In early 2000, I took on the challenge of developing IQinVision. 

Over the last 8 years, I have seen the company grow to become the worldwide leader in the megapixel IP camera market.

How has IQinVision been able not only to stay in business but also to thrive (while many of the companies producing megapixel IP cameras have gone out of business)?

There are three key elements to our ability to get where we are today -- patience, patience, and patience.  IQinVision has what you could call “patient money”, meaning our investors did not invest in the company for a quick return on their money.  This has allowed us to grow in a prudent manner, one in which we have been able to wait for the marketplace to develop naturally.  Many others failed simply because their timing was off, and they spent all of their investment capital before the market was ready to accept their products.

IQinVision is recognized for its world-class customer service and technical support.  Can you tell us more about it?

When you operate with a small, entrepreneurial company attitude, you must treat every customer like gold in order to survive.  When marketplaces are mature, there are plenty of customers to target for your product/services.  However, in a young and evolving marketplace this is not the case.  Our overriding goal is that all our customers enjoy doing business with IQinVision.  Most other organizations do not have this attitude.  As you can imagine, there are many elements to the company’s interaction with our customers that must be handled quickly and professionally if we are to meet that stated goal.  The most important issue here is that IQinVision’s partners and customers know what to expect from us as a company.

What are the biggest challenges you are facing now?

The global economic slow-down may prove to be a considerable challenge, although throughout calendar year 2008 we met or exceeded every one of our business goals.  Another major challenge we face every day is setting appropriate expectations with our customers.  Megapixel IP cameras can provide a world of benefits throughout the general security and surveillance marketplace, but they are not a “silver bullet” that can cure all problems.  Good design practices, site surveys, installation techniques, etc. are still required in order to understand and meet the customer’s security needs.

Managing our company’s rapid growth is another major issue, though we gladly accept this challenge!

Please explain the current megapixel IP camera market in the U.S. and which geographical markets do you think will have the biggest growth potential in 5 years time?

The U.S. market has recognized the value proposition of megapixel IP cameras and it is taking off.  Megapixel is now being deployed in all vertical markets including large and small retail, casinos, banking, even in residential applications.  The U.S. market should continue to grow quickly, similar to the growth in Western Europe over the last few years.  Beyond North America, we expect the Middle East to be a hot area for IQinVision in the immediate future.  Of course, the Asia Pacific market is key to our future, and we are just starting to invest there.

In what areas are you focusing your product development efforts

A lot of our current efforts are focused on developing a line of products that help simplify system design, system installation, and system set-up.  And, of course, improving even further on IQinVision’s well-known, superior video quality. 

How would you describe IQinVision’s products in 5 words?

World’s most valuable IP cameras

A lot of people are interested in video surveillance nowadays.  Do you have any specific target customer?

We have not spent a great deal of energy targeting specific verticals because in many cases they have come to us due to their dissatisfaction with the performance of existing “standard resolution” systems.  Initially, we thought our main market was for wide-area coverage applications, but we have found that virtually every market application benefits from the higher image quality and better camera coverage IQeye megapixel technology delivers.

Please comment on what you think the megapixel IP camera market will look like in 10 years time.

In 10 years, 50% of the cameras being installed worldwide will be megapixel or multi-megapixel network cameras.