January 2007

Ireland's Netwatch poised for growth [Clare Cronin, Security Systems News Europe]

 

Carlow, Ireland - "Attention, you with the brick your actions are being monitored..." The voice of Irish Netwatch speaks directly to intruders through its remote security monitoring systems, and these integrators claim a 95 percent sucess rate in scaring off potential criminals.

This year the company has been awarded the PA Consulting Group Award (Ireland) for Management Excellence, held in association with the Sunday Times. Founded in 2003, Netwatch was presented with the PA's Newly Established Organisation Award by the Irish Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Bertie Ahern, in Dublin recently.

Most of the firm's 500 customers are in Ireland, but managing director David Walsh noted, "There are no limitations to where our systems can work". Already the company has clients in Spain, the UK and Arizona, USA. The greatest demand so far has proved to be property protection for garages, building and other commercial and Industrial firms.

"The Challenge now for Netwatch is to scale up" said co-founder Niall Kelly. Based here and currently employing 50, there are plans to increase this figure to 100 in the next three to four years. 

The company is the first in Ireland to use satellite and Internet based technologies to provide remote visual security monitoring to businesses and speak directly to intruders. This represented "a real breakthrough," says Netwatch marketing director, Charlie Purcell.

The breakthrough came about when owners and co-founders Walsh and Kelly travelled to Australia to meet with Vision Systems. Kelly the technical director, spotted the potential of adapting their system, used in military installations, to commercial security systems.

A Technology licensing agreement with Vision Systems followed, and Netwatch then developed new software to meet their needs. The advantages, as outlined by Walsh, are the security of manned guards at a fraction of the cost, and the elimination of costly false alarms.

"Newatch are not tied to any individual manufacturer," said Purcell, "we use ADPRO and Siemens proven top of the range brands." 

The System uses broadband, the preferred option or an ISDN line or GPS. The Monitoring staff are all IT graduates, and are alerted as soon as the perimeter fence is breached. They then respond with a personalised audio warning. Intruders are made aware that they are on CCTV and that the police are on the way.