Comments on: Cisco Creating Managed Video Surveillance Opportunities

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 17:14:00 +0000

Cisco WAAS Review: Nope, we haven’t read the report. We respect Gartner but we don’t subscribe to their services. Are you a Cisco employee? Gartner employee? Why did you mention the report? Do I sense a magic quadrant pitch coming?

By: cisco waas review

cisco waas review — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 12:13:16 +0000

Have you seen the latest Gartner report about Cisco WAAS?

By: Andres Armeda

Andres Armeda — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 03:12:43 +0000

The market is growing and we are seeing a larger demand for our hosted surveillance video platform as well. We released Secure-i Hosted Video Recorder (HVR) last month which requires nothing more than the camera and a broadband connection client side.

I have to agree with John that Cisco will be competing with 6-10 specialist companies that have been optimizing video for SaaS, not sure Cisco can compete with current price points. Joe makes a good point though, you should never underestimate Cisco, they always find a way.

At the end of the day, there is a need for hosted surveillance and there are companies like Secure-i Inc. and byRemote out there doing it very well.

byRemote, we are also monitoring Cisco, we’ve seen an increase of traffic from them on various key phrases over the past month’s, it will be interesting to see where this all heads.

Cheers,

Andres

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 21:50:43 +0000

byRemote: Please keep us posted re: your perspectives. We strive to make sure all visitors can have a voice on this site.

By: byRemote

byRemote — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 21:08:19 +0000

Hi Joe, thank you for the invitation to post our link. Our site may be found at http://www.byremote.net. We too are watching what Cisco may be planning since we have seen them hit our site by doing a search on Google for “hosted video surveillance”. I am not sure if they are looking in to an SaaS platform or if they are going the managed services route. In either case, it should be interesting.

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 14:48:06 +0000

byRemote: Please feel free to share your company URL so that readers can get more info in the future. We welcome links on this site as long as they provide more info for our readers instead of shamelessly hyping a specific product.

Thanks again for reading/visiting MSPmentor.

By: byRemote

byRemote — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 03:21:26 +0000

Dan Caruso: I may be able to offer some perspective from a company who provides both the hosted and managed surveillance services. Although the market is defining Managed Video as a Service (MVaaS) as a “hosted” environment with off-site storage of video with web-based streaming video and archive retrieval, that is not exactly how our company defines MVaaS. Our MVaaS offering is actually managed services for IP video surveillance systems where the storage is provided by the customer no matter where it is located. We “manage” their system remotely by providing the initial software, software updates & upgrades, OS updates, system health checks & monitoring, notifications as well as on-going support built in to one monthly fee. It ultimately takes the responsibility of maintaining an on-premise system away from the consumer and puts it is the hands of a service provider like smaller IT companies and VARs.

This is the solution our VAR partners are eager to resell to their customer-base due to its natural fit with their existing managed service offerings. This is most likely the market Cisco is trying to capture, but I can tell them that this is not a new concept.

Our VAR partners are adding PoE-enabled IP cameras on to existing or newly installed enterprise Cisco PoE networks which are also running the client’s Cisco phone system, etc. The VAR manages the network, servers, workstations, phone system and now the surveillance system.

MVaaS in our world is managed video surveillance. The MVaaS being coined as an industry term is what we call our Hosted Video as a Service or HVaaS. So I guess the simplest explanation of the differences between “hosted” and “managed” video surveillance is where the storage is located and Cisco is looking at the latter so VARs can add the surveillance hardware and software in to their managed services offerings which will increase their monthly recurring revenue. I don’t believe it has anything to do with SaaS, but I could be wrong.

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:25:41 +0000

MSP Monstor: I know video surveillance is a big opportunity for MSP. But from your perspective, will MSPs face challenges (business, technical, legal) as they attempt to store and sometimes dispose of those video images?

By: The MSP Monstor

The MSP Monstor — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:46:26 +0000

Surveilance is an easy sale to a lot of SMBs. Think about it? the majority of SMB companies will go with what ever their MSP tells them to do, if you have a good wrap with them.

This is a great bundling offering, and they will love you for it. And if you can push cisco on em… DO IT!

By: Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 15:29:08 +0000

John Honovich: I hope you’ll continue to visit MSPmentor and weigh in with perspectives on MVaaS. I’m not saying that we will always agree with your perspectives, but it’s good to have multiple voices offering their expertise.

Best
-jp