ASSA ABLOY Execs Talk Access Control Market, Recent Acquisitions

What are ASSA ABLOY’s strategies for the dealer/integrator channel? How does the business help them succeed?

HUDDART: We have really multiple go-to-market strategies that include different channel members, like contract hardware distributors, wholesalers, locksmiths, access control OEMs and systems integrators. It varies by the types of products. Traditional locks generally have a different channel mix than our IP-based locks. There’s really not a short answer to that question.

We have multiple specialist sales roles that help all of those channel members, but importantly also call on end users. The more technology you throw at a market the more you need to invest in and use the salespeople to really help guide purchasing decisions for that end user who’s faced with more and more options today than they were just a few years ago.

However, we never sell to end users. We’re working typically in conjunction with an integrator and/or OEM partner, working with them to help educate and be a consultative salesforce in conjunction with our channel partners at the end-user level. A lot of times our channel partners are dealing with multiple products and technologies. We help them basically create that demand with end users and sell through the channels.

The biggest initiative for the ASSA ABLOY side is our team of 18 access control sales specialists called the Integrated Security Solutions Team. They work with integrators, often doing joint sales calls with the customers of those integrators, to really help do things like site surveys, configure part numbers, do training sessions and get the right integrator partners certified in our products.

We also do all the typical collateral like websites, digital marketing and the rest of it. But this is still a belly-to-belly sales industry, especially for the bigger projects. It’s important for us to make the investment in people to work alongside others in the integration community.

Technicians install a Sargent Passport WiFi-enabled mortise lock (top). ASSA ABLOY’s North American electronic access control headquarters reside in New Haven, Conn. (middle). Although ASSA ABLOY acquired HID Global in 2000 the access card and reader leader runs as a separate entity under the parent, including having its own booth at tradeshows (bottom).

With IoT and convergence do you see the lines blurring among security integrators, electrical contractors, IT VARs, A/V integrators, etc. or even locksmiths?

HUDDART: There’s some blurring between integrators and locksmiths. This is partly because of some of the technologies we’ve launched into the marketplace, such as locks that have more intelligence. We’ve created solutions in our Medeco brand that make keys smarter than a simple brass mechanical key to do access control functions.

So definitely we’ve enabled locksmiths to grow from a historically mechanical perspective. And we’ve helped integrators grow from what’s historically been more of a traditional card reader approach to access control, to give them more options in locking solutions. We’ve enabled both sides to migrate a bit toward each other.

Integrators have really realized they need more skills around the door, skills that locksmiths have had. Many of them have actually either acquired a locksmith or partnered with locksmiths to deploy many of the lock technologies that we offer. However, in the big picture most of the market is still very entrenched in their own place they’ve historically played.

There has also been some blurring between physical security and IT integrators. As access products in the controller world and those in the lock world have become more challenging from an IT perspective, security integrators have had to better understand the lay of the land before deploying networked solutions. More and more these devices and systems are connected to the same building infrastructure doing other mission-critical things for the business.

And so the end user’s IT department has also become more important in access control decision making. Certainly, integrators have been responding to that in terms of the skills their team has onboard. That in theory has given an advantage to VARs on the IT side, but their challenge is to learn the security side.

JOHNSON: We have had to learn about both the locksmith and security dealer industries. We came to learn when it comes to door and the lock and the strike and all the different parts and pieces, there are lots of nuances in how the locking mechanism operates. There’s a certain level of skill and expertise a locksmith brings, especially if you have a very old lock or old door. On the security side, we’ve spent a lot of time enabling security dealers to very quickly make the lock on a door a smart, electronically controllable lock without requiring changing out the locking mechanism, without requiring a locksmith’s level of expertise. That was largely the aim with our retrofit device, which has proven very successful with our security dealer partners.

Let’s get into some technology. What is the corporate posture on open versus proprietary access control platforms?

BARNETTE: Mercury has been on the forefront of the open platform push in the access control space, even in things like [SIA standard] OSDP for how to connect other devices in a more seamless manner. HID was one of the founding members of the OSDP standard too, so there’s a long history of both of us pushing open standards in this space. OSDP is more than 10 years old and, while growing, is still a small portion of the market.

HUDDART: On the ASSA ABLOY side, we also believe in open platforms. They generally create a bigger pie more quickly in our industry than when you don’t have them. We are on various boards and committees to further the cause, as well as use OSDP in many of our products. On the residential side, there are many competing IoT protocols. We try to use those standards, things like ZigBee, Z-Wave and Thread, which are all standards in home control. Bluetooth is another important one.

ASSA ABLOY is the global leader in door opening solutions. Pictured here are products from (left-right) HID Global, the recently acquired August Home, Yale (integrated with Google’s Nest), and Corbin Russwin and Sargent. Together they demonstrate the company’s advances in IoT and wireless technologies.

What are some access technologies you’re excited about?

BARNETTE: The move to Cloud is going to be changing the next five to 10 years. We’ll look back and go, “Why did we ever do it any differently?” But it will take a significant amount of time for the market to move. Mobile credentials are going to be another big game-changer, and how those credentials are going to be used in the future will finally be realized. We will see breakthroughs in having a level of assurance with that mobile credential for other applications, and HID is at the forefront of that.

With the integrations with wireless and IP locks, I see the Mercury product being the glue that ties these things together. As the proliferation of these devices happen in a building, it becomes better to have a cluster of these reporting into an intelligent device like a Mercury panel, and then having that device not only help manage those sensors, locks and ancillary devices, but then providing a single point that plugs into the Cloud. We’re going to see a tremendous shift the next few years, as more and more of these things get integrated together. It’s an exciting time.

HUDDART: I’d echo the mobile comment from Matt. You may have seen an announcement from Apple talking about doing pilots with six universities where their vision is the students can use their iOS devices and Apple Wallet to have a mobile experience throughout the campus including access control. That makes it an exciting development because it really opens up NFC for access with that development.

For commercial security, I’ll add in access control sustainability and power consumption. We’ve been running around taking power out of our components that drive access control systems. Just like the move from incandescent to LED lightbulbs for your building infrastructure, we believe power is an increasingly important criteria. We’ve actually won projects based on demonstrating we consume sometimes up to 97% less energy than traditional components.

BARNETTE: One thing I would add to this access technology conversation is cybersecurity. Obviously, that’s something we need to all take very seriously, and make sure that not only our products are being built and long-term lifecycles are providing more a more cyber-secure environment, but we’re educating the marketplace. We can add all of these great features and functions to our product, but they need to be turned on and configured in real-world environments. Educating the marketplace is a big part of our corporate mandate.

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