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HD cameras steal the show

IMS Research forecasts that despite police department budgets coming under increasing pressure across the USA, the HD (high-definition) camera market onboard police cars is set to grow at over 20% over the next four years. This is one of the findings from IMS Research’s latest report on the mobile video surveillance equipment market.

Currently WatchGuard Video’s 4RE solution is designed for the police in-car video surveillance market and primarily used. However, a number of other mobile video surveillance equipment manufacturers are currently developing HD solutions, with release dates ranging from between nine and 12 months.

According to report author, Oliver Philippou, “The key driver for HD video is simply better quality images. As camera prices decline, compression methods become more advanced, and new wireless draft specifications, such as 802.11 ac, make handling large amounts of data quicker and more efficient, the use of HD cameras will increasingly become a more viable option.”

Philippou continues, “That being said, the main issue with using HD cameras remains the storage of the video. The length of time that video has to be kept by police departments varies, with some states in the USA requiring a full 365 days of video storage when used as evidence. Even with better compression methods, recording in HD is likely to increase the amount of data by a factor of three or four at the very least. With the recent floods in Thailand causing serious production issues for HDD, the price rises in HDD storage costs would increase considerably.”

IMS Research forecasts that, despite the HD camera market growing significantly quicker than the standard camera market, HD cameras will still account for less than 15% of the total American in-car police video surveillance camera market in 2015.

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