Today’s technological landscape is rapidly evolving, and this allows those delivering smart solutions to react with speed when needs arise. A great example is the COVID-19 pandemic. Because many technology-based companies with a background in analytics have embraced the open platform approach, they were able to act swiftly to deliver a range of solutions which assisted with social distancing, face covering management, control of flow through buildings and sites, temperature detection, etc..
The flexibility of open platform app-based technologies isn’t limited to offering assistance dealing with the pandemic. A whole range of applications are enjoying the added value of smart technologies, including security, safety, building and site management, business intelligence, traffic control, retail marketing and other specialist use-cases.
By allowing the use of advanced hardware and application-based software which can be loaded onto an edge device, the open platform approach delivers smart systems which are efficient, robust and cost-effective. The hardware can run multiple applications, and leveraging their processing power to add value as and when new challenges arise is a significant part of their appeal.
Security & Safety Things connects camera manufacturers, developers, integrators and end users through a game-changing IoT platform. The platform harnesses the growing computing power of security cameras to provide valuable enterprise-wide operational intelligence for facilities and organisations in a variety of industries. Developers use the platform to rapidly create new apps for a variety of cameras from different manufacturers and offer these apps through Security & Safety Things’ open Application Store.
Through this platform, Security & Safety Things effectively turns cameras into multi-purpose IoT sensors that can be flexibly adapted to provide value in security, business intelligence and beyond. This frees security cameras from the confines of predefined use cases. Ultimately, end users and system integrators enjoy the freedom to flexibly pair a wide variety of cameras and apps to meet very specific needs and use cases.
The basis for all this is Security & Safety Things’ operating system for IP cameras, built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). It is free of charge for camera manufacturers. The OS leverages the expanding processing and analytic power of modern IP cameras to run powerful AI-enabled analytic applications. These automate video data analysis, exponentially increasing the amount of operational intelligence that can be mined from traditional IP-based surveillance footage. Apps are created by highly specialised third-party developers and are available through the platform’s open Application Store.
Thanks to increased standardisation through the Security & Safety Things OS, third-party developers now only have to develop an app once for it to run on different camera brands and form factors. This enables them to redirect resources previously tied up in the integration of their apps to various proprietary camera operating systems, to the development of new apps. End-users will see new innovations and more specialised apps coming to market much more often. Taking advantage of such innovative developments is also no longer tied to purchasing new hardware, since supported cameras can simply be re-equipped with new apps during their lifecycle.
With this approach, Security & Safety Things promotes a paradigm shift for how video solutions are planned, deployed and maintained. System integrators and customers can now pick and mix any combination of camera and analytics capability to support almost any use case. The solution means more than one app can simultaneously run on one camera, so the same camera can do multiple jobs.
To support the deployment and maintenance of such solutions, Security & Safety Things offers a comprehensive Device Management Portal that enables remote management of any connected camera. Apps can be installed and managed through the portal, giving users statistics about camera status.
The Application Store is filled with apps, various projects are already live.
Security & Safety Things, together with its camera partners, is already running a number of projects in a live setting. These support use cases including heat mapping and queue analysis in retail stores, automated payment processing or license plate recognition for barrier-free traffic.