16 Jan Intersec: Q&A with Genetec
We’re delighted to be back at Intersec! Reconnecting with industry professionals means we’ve also had the chance to catch up with some of the companies attending the show.
Day one of Intersec saw us chatting with Firas Jadalla, Regional Director for Genetec for the Middle East region. 2022 marks Jadalla’s 17th year with Genetec, as well the 17th year that the company has had a presence in the Middle East.
One of the things we were keen to hear from Jadalla about was what can we expect for 2022? “I think we, as Genetec, have been leading with our unified security approach… But cyber security also plays a very important role within our solution, and we’ll see more and more. I mean, during the pandemic, during the two years, we have seen an increased number of attacks and how cyber security has started to prevail actually as an important aspect within the physical security industry. And this is something that will continue.”
The company is exhibiting its unified solution at Intersec, as Jadalla explained: “So, with unified solution, we are talking about security centre where we are talking about Omnicast. Our video management solution synergies, our access control solution and all of these are under one umbrella.”
The company is also seeing growth in technologies that can support the rise of smart cities, and, as many other companies will attest, the global pandemic also saw product lines quickly adapted to reflect how society has altered, so there is lots of innovations being showcased at Genetec’s stand.
Genetec’s Vice President of Sales Global, Michel Chalouhi also had time for a chat with us, and was able to explain more about how Genetec’s product range is reflecting the ‘new normal’ – which means we’ve all had to readjust to the way in which we interact. “When you talk access control, we talk about visitor management, you talk about classic control where what you’re trying to do is minimise any friction or any touch, right?
“So moving to touchless. So the important part is picking as we proceed, we’ve always been about partnerships and building over partnership with some of the technology partners out there. So if you look at the technologies that we integrate with, mainly around touchless technology, that is going to be one way for us to adapt and you know the other way are in the little things.
“For example, what we’re demo-ing here, is the visitor management of how you get a visitor into your facility and have them move into the areas where they have access to without having to exchange badges and touch things.
“Friction, for example, what we’re doing here, you go from a visitor invitation to issuing a barcode on his phone that they will scan on the printer, get their own self print and use that as their credential, as they’re moving around the facility. And that’s what they used to check out throughout that process.
“There’s no human intervention, there’s no exchange of physical contact at that. So, these are just some quick examples that we’re doing as an organisation to, to adapt to this new reality.”
And how does it feel to be back at Intersec? “We’ve come here every year in January,” explains Chalouhi. “I mean, for us, reconnecting with the partners that we have around the area is key, right? Everybody adapted to the new reality of getting teams meeting but we’re social beings in general. So getting out there and reconnecting with some of our partners, some of our customers coming here, a 15-minutes face-to-face meeting it’s great.”