Surveillance & Monitoring Driving the Demand for Smart Cameras

Surveillance and monitoring, which was once limited to government and behemoth commercial buildings, is now increasingly being adopted by general consumers. Concerns about the safety of their loved ones and their property has prompted many homeowners to buy surveillance equipment. Smart cameras, which do away with the need of a separate recording mechanism, are in demand owing to this growing trend among consumers.

The effectiveness of smart cameras in identifying the perpetrators of terrorist activities has brought the focus of key stakeholders in developing more holistic solutions. Video surveillance around the world has increased manifold since the 9/11 and London tube attacks. Even developing countries are channelising their resources to bring in a more efficient security system and smart cameras are expected to play an important role in this.

Although consumer demand for surveillance and monitoring is anticipated to drive the demand for smart cameras in the future, smart cameras are used in a number of other applications.

Although surveillance and monitoring is one of the key factors for growing demand of smart cameras, their use in manufacturing units for machine vision is also expected to contribute to their demand. Industries around the world are focusing on quality control and smart cameras are helping them in this pursuit. Smart cameras embedded in machines take split-second images of the products, and the information is then relayed to the control unit for quality control. It is expected that the use of smart cameras in quality control will increase in future, as the general trend in the industry currently is to create more automated functions with minimal human interaction.

The technology for smart cameras has been around for a long time, but their high cost has always remained a barrier to large-scale adoption. However, innovation in the CMOS image sensors (CIS) in the later part of 1990s paved the way for incorporating cost-effective components in today’s smart cameras. CIS has numerous advantages over CCD—which was earlier used to manufacture smart cameras—such as affordability and efficient image processing.

Research and development has played an important role in the development of smart cameras. Leading research institutions around the world have been working on making computer vision and pattern recognition reliable, accurate, and seamless. The most important development has been in the field of intelligent application-specific information processor (ASIP). The ASIP is built into the camera system, and is one of the most effective components of the smart camera.

Availability of highly efficient processors, software, and tools has augured well for making embedded system technologies more efficient. Smart camera manufacturers have been provided with an array of options, and the competition in the market has worked in bringing the prices down.

The above-mentioned factors for the growing demand of smart cameras have translated into making smart camera market a lucrative one for manufacturers and retailers. According to a report by Future Market Insights, the global smart camera market is anticipated to witness a CAGR of 23.84% by 2020, reaching a valuation of US$ 9.82 Bn. The total number of shipments of smart camera are expected to reach 85.47 Mn units by the end of 2020.

The key components of smart cameras, including image sensor, communication interface, lens, display and processors, are also anticipated to witness robust demand in the future. It is expected that lens and processors will witness phenomenal growth and key stakeholders stand to benefit from this.

Overall, the demand for smart camera will witness robust growth in the future, and key stakeholders in the market can look forward to a slew of opportunities in the global smart camera market.

Browse Full: "Smart Camera Market: Global Industry Analysis and Opportunity Assessment 2015 - 2020" Market Research Report at http://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/details/smart-camera-market