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Access control has advanced beyond simple entry solutions.

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IRIS SCANNING: The future?

Monteiro explains: "With a card you can give it to someone else to go in and out, so you can use a combination of the two to enter. When somebody is entering the office they use the card and the fingerprint but when they are leaving to go out they just use the fingerprint. It makes it more secure."

Cameras can also be combined with this system in order to ramp up security. Axis Communications' regional sales manager Baraa Al Akkad explains: "It can be as simple as monitoring one door with a camera and an access control terminal or reader.

When people try to access the door they use their card then the camera takes snapshots for identification. You can also integrate the data transaction of the access control system through the video to make sure that the right card holder gained access."

Integrated access

Integration with other security systems and control of these solutions through a building management system (BMG) is a direction the market is taking.

Monteiro says about his own product: "If you use it with a BMG system it works together. It works hand-in-hand because the interface is very similar, and it is something which you can add on to something else. We don't make cameras but we can use cameras from other companies which work with these ones."

Al Akkad also believes the move towards IP-based solutions is the future of the industry.

He says: "Some of the advantages of IP surveillance solutions are flexibility, remote accessibility, user friendliness and ease of use. When you have digital IP solutions it is very easy to integrate with other security products like access control and fire and alarm systems. These are big advantages over CCTV and it is very important for contractors or consultants to have those advantages to make life easier."

Palatsoukas also has seen the shift, but sees problems in the future: "One of the big things that we see out there is a lot of companies moving from traditional architectures to IP-based. And our solution has been built to IP from day one. A lot of the competition has been traditionally based with a network adapter added and called it IP. But, in fact, it's the software at the back end of the server that has to be able to scale IP, and I would say the majority of the products on the market haven't been built with that in mind."

One major technology that could be introduced further on in the future is iris scanning. Monteiro reveals: "We are looking at iris scanning systems mated to biometrics and a password system for the future."

Despite low crime rates in this region companies will always have a ‘better safe than sorry' attitude, and this together with the increase in the number of buildings comes an increase in the number of doors; the majority of which will need access control systems.

The Middle East access control market is one waiting for the wave of biometric solutions to hit it. Once it does it seems it will be changed forever with companies either riding that particular wave of success or being swept away by firms that do. Mahajan affirms: "In the next five years biometric technology is going to boom throughout the world, not only in the GCC."

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