How Video Surveillance as a Service Provides Consistent Business Value

Video surveillance as a service (VSaaS) has become an increasingly sought after video security solution. With the emergence of VSaaS in the video security industry, this innovation has revolutionized how businesses can leverage their surveillance solutions, enabling greater flexibility in how they deploy and scale their systems across locations. 

A VSaaS solution provides this flexibility thanks to the cloud. New innovations, updates, and support can be pushed out via the cloud, so businesses have access to these changes. If security vulnerabilities are found, patches can be pushed alongside updates. This not only creates a more secure solution, but it also offers access to advanced technology, such as AI-powered video analytics. 

As VSaaS providers continue to innovate their offerings, it’s expected that the market will shift in favor of video surveillance as a service. For now, buyers need to be aware of the difference between VMS and VSaaS, and what advantages VSaaS brings to the table as opposed to legacy systems. 

What Is VSaaS? – Video Surveillance as a Service Defined 

VSaaS, is a subscription-based model which provides video security on a continual basis from the provider themselves. VSaaS provides businesses with access to advanced and ever-innovating video surveillance platforms, all handled through the cloud. The software for a VSaaS solution is managed centrally, either through the software provider themselves or a security integrator, enabling browser-based access to the surveillance solution. Because of this, plus its convenient pricing, VSaaS has quickly become a popular choice for many organizations. 

To understand the rise of VSaaS, it helps to look at the evolution of cloud computing, which directly enabled its development. Cloud computing, which emerged in the 2000s, provided cloud services to users in the form of a utility. Users would pay for the services they used monthly while avoiding charges for unconsumed resources. This convenient model, while initially accessible on a primarily consumer-oriented basis, became attractive to larger enterprise businesses as a method for providing their own products and services to customers. 

These developments contributed to the emergence of software as a service (SaaS), through which software is delivered via subscription‑based models. Over the past two decades, similar principles have been adopted in the video surveillance industry, leading to the rise of VSaaS as an alternative to traditional pricing models. yet adopted this technology to consider its benefits. 

VSaaS vs VMS – What Are the Main Differences?

Debate surrounding VSaaS and traditional video management systems (VMS) has intensified over the past two decades with the emergence of VSaaS, even as video surveillance itself has existed for more than 70 years. During those 70 years, businesses have traditionally purchased their own VMS, setting up the requisite hardware and software in a location singular to their organization. Owning the VMS requires businesses to make a single upfront payment, with future upgrades or maintenance requiring additional costs down the road. 

The emergence of VSaaS shifted this long-established practice, and its initial offerings were criticized as lacking the advanced functionalities of VMS, such as the ability to use AI video analytics and intelligent search, due to its recent invention. In fact, VMS and VSaaS were seen as two opposing solutions, offering different advantages and disadvantages. 

Today, modern VSaaS platforms offer both the advantages and flexibility of a VSaaS solution while also providing the advanced functionalities previously exclusive to VMS. This includes access to video analytics, advanced search capabilities, and much more. Not only that, but today’s VSaaS can also work alongside VMS deployments under a single platform. For businesses who have paid upfront for a single solution at a location but seek to expand their solution elsewhere, VSaaS’ open platform capabilities enable businesses to integrate outside systems into a single pane of glass without having to rip out their existing security infrastructure and completely replace it. 

VSaaS also provides a more direct path to cloud-based access. Traditional VMS solutions are typically designed for on‑premises use but can support remote access with additional configuration and ongoing maintenance by the organization. Thanks to VSaaS’ cloud capabilities, businesses can easily view video from wherever they are on whatever device. This convenient functionality has empowered businesses and enabled them to centralize their security for better employee, customer, and student safety, as well as optimized operations. 

Finally, unlike traditional VMS, VSaaS’ subscription‑based payment model enables a value‑added service contract that promotes ongoing maintenance and monitoring. This approach fosters a longer‑term dealer relationship and helps organizations maximize the value of their surveillance investment.

How VSaaS Future-Proofs Video Surveillance

The flexibility and scalability offered by VSaaS solutions offer a wide range of benefits to businesses everywhere, including secure, reliable cloud connectivity, continual updates and improvements, easy-to-use platform functionalities, and a streamlined path to the cloud. While traditional systems require large upfront expenditures, VSaaS transforms these expenses into manageable ongoing payments, enabling your business to take advantage of a cloud-managed video security system tailored to the needs of your organization. 

Below, we examine four major benefits offered by a VSaaS solution, and how these advantages can improve business operations and security in a flexible, cost-effective way. 

1. Cloud Reliability 

A cloud VSaaS solution ensures your business always has video when you need it. This is accomplished through regular updates and system maintenance pushed via the cloud, which helps keep your software current and cybersecure so you can rest easy knowing you’re using a trustworthy platform. 

VSaaS solutions also offer proactive insights remotely, so you can quickly identify and remedy problems with your security system. Built-in features to monitor the health of your system ensure your surveillance is working as expected to make undetected system failures a thing of the past. If a camera or recorder unexpectedly goes down, your team will be alerted quickly so you can fix issues as they occur. 

Thanks to the cloud, businesses can depend on reliable security in a VSaaS solution.

2. Future Ready 

Another advantage of VSaaS is that it helps prepare your business for the future with continual updates and improvements delivered directly from the cloud, such as access to advanced video analytics. In contrast to traditional offerings, VSaaS is an ever-evolving solution, ensuring you can leverage the latest advancements in software as soon as they’re available. 

Additionally, a VSaaS solution with an open platform allows you to integrate existing business systems with your video security, such as your access control access control, identity management, point of sale, and more, all while scaling your security effortlessly with no limit on the number of devices or locations associated with your account. Not only that, but a VSaaS solution provides on-going support to your team, so you can get the most out of new releases. 

Opting for a VSaaS solution ensures your business stays on the cutting edge of surveillance innovation, ultimately providing greater return on your security investment. 

3. Ease of Use 

A cloud VSaaS solution provides ease of use in a centralized platform, improving operational efficiencies with user management, role-based user groups, roaming profiles, and online video export and sharing, allowing seamless control over your VSaaS system. 

These remote capabilities are enhanced with client versatility, which allows you to connect to your cameras and recorders through web, desktop, or mobile applications, enabling you and your team to access your video anytime, anywhere. If your team is on-the-go or often off-site, using a mobile device to access your video can provide the ease of use needed to conduct operations effectively. 

Utilizing these convenient, user-friendly features optimizes teams across your organization, from IT to security and beyond, leading to better workflows and less time spent on redundant tasks 

4. Streamlined Path to the Cloud 

VSaaS provides an easy and affordable path to the cloud through a transparent and flexible pricing model, allowing you to deploy your system faster and scale at your own pace. 

VSaaS has much lower startup costs than traditional security systems, which can be beneficial if you want to leverage security but need to find an option that works within your company’s budget. VSaaS’s transparent subscription model is predictable, so you can more easily budget your video security, allowing you to deploy your system faster and scale at your own pace. Renewing your subscription is also easy for continual access to the cloud around the clock. 

By providing a cost-effective solution, VSaaS helps businesses leverage cloud video in a manner best suited for their organizational needs, helping them deploy advanced surveillance in the most efficient way for their everyday operations. 

Utilize OpenEye’s Video Surveillance as a Service Solution Today

The future of video surveillance is clear. Businesses want more from their video surveillance investments and need these systems to prove their worth now and in the future. VSaaS provides much more than traditional security, offering important data, insights, and functionality beyond securing the business while adding tangible investment value to businesses. Unlike traditional offerings, VSaaS is an investment that will easily grow and scale with your business over time. 

OpenEye helps you meet the needs of your business today while preparing for the goals of tomorrow through our powerful cloud-managed video platform. The OpenEye Web Services (OWS) VSaaS solution offers cloud reliability to ensure you always have video when you need it, with regular system maintenance and updates pushed via the cloud and automated health monitoring to keep your system running around the clock. 

OWS prepares businesses for the future with continuous system improvements and an R&D team actively adding new features while keeping solutions up to date with the latest innovations, including video analytics, Location Arming, intelligent video monitoring tools, and more, alongside ongoing support from the OpenEye team. OWS’ open ecosystem integrates with other business systems to provide a single, unified solution. Additionally, you can add any number of locations and devices to an account, so your security keeps pace with your business. 

With OpenEye’s cloud video surveillance platform, you can access your video anytime, anywhere, from any client. OWS helps streamline your security and business operations with centralized cloud management of locations, devices and users. 

With OWS, getting started is both easy and affordable. Our subscription service provides an easy path to the cloud through a transparent and flexible pricing model, allowing you to deploy your system faster and scale at your own pace.

Learn more about how OpenEye’s VSaaS solution prepares businesses for the needs of today and tomorrow.