Security Sales & Integration September 2022 - 33

envisioned running two platforms. We wanted
the optionality because their platform has integrations
with other solution providers that
would be deemed competitive with the Alarm.
com for Business offering. Whether that be
integration of the various access control platforms
or other intrusion platforms, we want to
give our partners a choice. We don't want to
strongarm them into technology that you have
to use this configuration. With that said, we
put together a set of integration points where
the Alarm.com for Business technology surfaces
events and the OpenEye technology puts it
on a video timeline, which is the way OpenEye
integrates with a lot of its other partners.
Then with Alarm.com for Business, we've taken
OpenEye's technology assets and embedded
them directly in the solution. It's really under
the covers and the end user will see the benefits
in these enhanced VSaaS solutions if they're using
the Alarm.com for Commercial video offering,
but they're independent from the OpenEye
platform. It's a little complicated as you can tell.
Brian Lohse: If you want to use Alarm.com
intrusion and access control and OpenEye video,
the three play very nicely together. You can
open the Alarm.com app, find this person, enter
this door. I want to see the video, you click that
event, it pulls up in the OpenEye app, jumps to
the associated camera at the associated time of
that event. There's a fairly seamless integration
between the two. There are tradeoffs to offering
a more complex offering.
A lot of customers that choose Alarm.com
for Business are looking for something that's
zero hassle in terms of need to have IT expertise
or willingness to take a training class. If
you look at SMB, a lot of it actually is consumer
level in the sense of the time investment
the owner is willing to spend. For that offering,
you actually have to take options away to make
it very easy to consume. Then you jump over
the fence to OpenEye where you get much
more sophisticated tools that higher end customer
is looking for. There's multiple ways to
skin a cat depending on the specific needs of
the customer.
News recently broke that Alarm.com
is getting into the solar business. Why
the interest and where do you see that
market heading?
Bedell: We've had elements in the platform
securitysales.com
SEPTEMBER 2022 Security Sales & Integration 33
that are specifically related to solar for some
time. When we work with our partners, we're
constantly having discussions around where
they're trying to take their businesses. Several
of our largest security partners have been getting
into solar for a while. There's been a bit of
an acceleration that we've seen in the past 12
months. We decided to package up these assets
we've developed and are largely sitting in a limited
release or beta form.
It's a mix of automation services, energy metering,
integration with the solar inverter, all of
this technology we'd had in a development state,
we decided to release it in an actual product
state. We did so in concert with interest from
select partners believing there is a macro trend
here where there's going to be more residential
solar. And there's an obvious tie-in to the smart
home around energy monitoring and metering
that makes sense. We're big believers in these
kinds of macro trends in the smart home.
The real question is when is the market going
to turn and partners really start to adopt and
sell the integrated offering, sell security or home
automation side by side with solar installations?
We just reached critical mass where we've had
enough interest from our security partners that
it made sense for us to go ahead and launch the
product formally.
How has this year's supply chain and inflation
challenges impacted Alarm.com?
Bedell: None of the inflation issues rippled
through our Q1 numbers nor did the supply
chain other than the costs. We haven't suffered
any product shortages, but like most vendors
we have struggled somewhat with the cost to
procure and ship the materials, so hardware
Often, we'll be
the first to market
with a technology
solution. The only
way you do that is
by being aware of
both the need of
the dealer plus the
new technology
resources we can
bring to bear.
- Jeff Bedell
Designed for service providers,
Alarm.com's new solar
monitoring solution includes a
Solar Automation & Awareness
service package and Solar
Program Certification Course.
http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.Alarm.com http://www.securitysales.com
Security Sales & Integration September 2022

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