Five pro-AV specialists on the technologies they are tipping for take-off
Which audiovisual technologies will take the UK market by storm over the next 12 to 18 months? We asked five specialist audiovisual integrators for their opinion
The professional audiovisual market is set to grow from $186bn to $230bn between 2018 and 2022, according to IHS Markit.
As part of our 2019 Audiovisual Integrator Report, we asked five pro-AV specialists to pinpoint the emerging AV technologies they see taking off over the coming years.
Here is a flavour of what they said:
Karl Deady, Cinos
Technology to watch: Crestron Flex
"Crestron Flex is a product that we've had under duress for a period of time. It allows you to collaborate with most of the new [videoconferencing vendors] like Zoom, and obviously, Microsoft, and others. It's a technology we've heavily invested in, heavily trained up on and done a lot of marketing around as well."
Euan Webster, Feltech
Technologies to watch: Analytics and AV over IP
"People like getting as much data and analytics out of their system as possible, whether that's how many hours the projector has been running or how many hours the lights have been on, to pertinent facts around how their meeting rooms and meeting spaces are being used. People want that captured more and more, so we're installing systems that pass that data onto them. I think that's going to be a big growth area over next year or two.
"AV is growing, and part of that is because IT [suppliers] have realised there's an opportunity there for them. A lot of AV kit now goes across Cat6 or Cat6a cabling using off-the-shelf switches and routers, so it was inevitable this was going to happen. We've been gearing up for AV over IP for about three years and it's a big thing for us now."
Graham Fry, SCC AVS
Technologies to watch: Lenovo and management software
"The video component of Microsoft Teams needs Windows 10 and Lenovo has got a better track record than anyone of building systems that work with Windows. So you've got people like Lenovo coming into the videoconferencing market who I think will become established players very quickly because they understand how to work with Microsoft.
"I think the traditional vendors will start looking at management software. Crestron has already come up with XiO Cloud. Barco, which makes massive projectors and big video walls, is now looking at the software that sits behind it all."
Ed Cook, AVMI
Technologies to watch: Microsoft Surface Hub 2
"I would say Zoom, but Zoom has already made its mark. We have seriously committed to the Surface Hub 2 as and when it's fully available. We think it's a very neat product. We have similar products from other manufacturers, but we think once Microsoft's marketing machine fully sinks in behind Surface Hub 2 we will see an increase in interest, which we've not seen yet. So we're ready. We're semi expecting that to take off when it becomes available in this country in the next month or two.
"We are also seeing a huge amount of interest in LED. As the pixel pitch gets smaller and smaller, LED displays are becoming more common in almost any size of room or space."
Kristian Cutting, GV Multimedia
Technologies to watch: AI and collaboration
"Everyone's looking at AI to see if it will have any bearing on what we do, and whether or not the universities adopt smart campuses, and how far they go with that. We've seen it on a lighter touch in some spaces. Now it's a case of whether or not that gets a heavier touch, with sensors everywhere and things turning it on when you enter the room.
"Everyone [in higher education] is looking at different ways to collaborate, share and deliver AV, whether that's using BYOD through products like Mersive and Kramer, or whether it's furniture based."
The full report is available here for CRN Essential subscribers
Also on CRN Essential in 2019:
Shadow Channel Report (or for abbreviated version see here)
2019 Print Provider Report (or for related news article see here)
2019 Cybersecurity Provider Report (or for related news article see here)
DaaS Adoption Report (or for related news article see here)
2019 Staff and Salaries Report (or for related news article see here)