As our team headed to Las Vegas for this year’s conference, we weren’t exactly sure what to expect due to COVID spikes and continued travel restrictions. But what we saw walking through the doors of Sands Conference Center was the irreplaceable energy of industry professionals from across the world. “I felt supercharged being back in Las Vegas for ISC West 2022,” said Zach Henderson, Northland’s Director of Managed Services. “The people that were in attendance were all smiling and enjoying each other’s company and I took a moment to step aside and look onto the gathering with gratitude and appreciation. We don’t get to do these sorts of things far frequently enough, and the power of presence is truly remarkable.”

Many of our team members agreed that having an opportunity to see co-workers, friends, partners, and clients in person provided invaluable opportunities. Oscar Carrasco, Customer Success Manager at Northland, shared his sentiment saying, “It was a great pleasure to host customers and enable them to express their challenges in person in order to help them identify possible solutions on the spot. We were able to facilitate introductions with key partners, schedule demos to answer questions, and immediately follow up with a plan of action.”

Just another example of this on-the-spot support is from Cullen Fair, Northland Program Manager, who was able to find a solution for a client’s challenges with the HES KS210 Series server cabinet lock. The client was having challenges finding a lock that was a single complete package with their HID elite key readers but that was not wireless. “Having the Northland team members, the clients that we service, and the suppliers all in one place allowed for immediate remedies to our client’s biggest challenges.”

While we wholly embraced the face-to-face interaction, there were some physical security trends and technologies that couldn’t be ignored as we roamed the show floor. Here are a few of them:

Supply Chain Issues
It’s no surprise that one of the hot topics of discussion for many manufacturers and integrators was the daunting supply chain issues facing the industry. And while there is only so much control over these larger industry issues, manufacturers took the time to address the challenges and share their perspective moving forward. “Supply chain issues seem to be the hottest topic and most difficult challenge for manufacturers, integrators, and customers and it appears that the supply chain challenges will continue into early 2023,” says Shad McPheters, Northland’s General Manager. While these issues don’t seem to be going away anytime soon, having a chance to hash it out helped bring awareness and manage expectations for the future.

AI and Analytics
While there have been many advancements in artificial intelligence over the past decade, people have traditionally remained skeptical about its ability to deliver. However, at this year’s show “It appeared that AI is becoming more universally integrated into common devices,” says Charles Baxter, a Security Consultant at Northland. He goes on to say that “Enterprising and enhancing security systems will move the industry forward if clients understand the benefits of the technology.” One product that stood out to Baxter was a pedestrian turnstile that not only allows electronic access and tailgating alerting but had integrated analytics that could detect and alert for a firearm or knife, body temperature, or mask compliance for locations requiring them. Our team expects to see more of this in the future, which was made apparent by the SIA New Product Showcase Judge’s Choice Winner, Hakimo’s Alarm Monitoring 2.0 product, which is meant to bring AI capabilities into SOCs around the world.

The Convergence of Physical and Cyber Security
“It’s clear that security is more hybrid than ever,” says Paula Balmori, Onboarding and Design Consultant. “Physical security is not just physical anymore and the relationship between cyber and physical security is going to continue to grow as we move forward.”
Companies and technologies like SecuriThings are making their mark on this continued convergence. “It’s IoT management done right for security items,” says Danny Chung, Global Director of Design and Consulting. “Firmware and software patches managed from a single location and password changing that can be planned and implemented without going to each device gives companies a streamlined approach to securing their company in its entirety.”

As a team, we look forward to implementing these takeaways and findings to continue pushing the industry forward and solving our clients’ biggest challenges!