We continue our series of 2026 predictions from security industry leaders with Maureen Carlson, co-founder, president and vice president of growth of System Surveyor. She offered her reflections on some of the biggest developments in the sector in 2025 last month.
Maureen Carlson 2026 Security Industry Predictions
Read on to check out Maureen Carlson’s 2026 security industry predictions. We’ll have many more predictions from others among the brightest minds in the security industry throughout the month!
Security Sales & Integration: What technology category or solution area do you see as 2026’s ripest, most profitable growth opportunity for security dealers, installers and integrators? Explain your reasoning.
Maureen Carlson: The biggest growth opportunity continues to be around retrofitting both video surveillance and access control technologies. While a lot of progress has been made, it is still a drop in the bucket and has the opportunity for significant continued investment to leverage cloud and artificial intelligence capabilities.
SSI: Which emerging security technologies do you think are overplayed? Which ones do you think will truly transform the practice of security integration in the coming years?
Carlson: It is unclear to me how effective sensors are for vape detection but there appears to be quite a bit of demand. Sensors designed to automate building management (for example, lighting) appear to be important as we modernize existing buildings and build new ones.
Better AI capabilities around video surveillance also appear to promise a lot of transformation opportunities. From our perspective, these technologies need to be designed and implemented thoughtfully and effectively from a physical standpoint to meet their outcome promises.
Additionally, I have heard many K-12 school and university customers talk about the significant value of cloud-based video surveillance by making it easier to implement and manage long term.
SSI: What’s getting better about the security industry these days? What seems to be getting worse?
Carlson: What is getting better: We are excited to see system integrators move from manual methods of design and implementation to a fully digital process from the site survey to sales to installation and life cycle management.
Customers expect accurate designs and proposals in hours or days, not weeks. The ability to collaborate with experts at manufacturer vendors and customers without emailing PDFs is a significant leap forward. The ecosystem is able to operate and scale at the next level.
What seems to be getting worse: there is still a need for rapid, consistent, high-quality implementation and installation. For companies that charge recurring revenue, it is not about the sales of the hardware; it is about getting it installed effectively and up and running. It’s not necessarily getting worse but it appears to be behind expectations.
SSI: What’s liable to catch some security industry dealers, installers and integrators off guard in the coming year?
Carlson: Three things come to mind:
- It is possible that we will continue to see new entrants and innovators with even more technologies to consider.
- Everyone will need to look at how AI will be used both as a key technology and also to run and streamline a business.
- What may catch dealers and integrators off guard is the race to digitize and software-enable the integrator’s core business – and how that will be a competitive differentiator.
SSI: What’s the single most pressing challenge that professionals in the security industry must tackle right now? And how would you suggest tackling it?
Carlson: The biggest issue is bringing on new labor and ensuring they can quickly be productive to help a business scale up and provide excellent customer service. Customer expectations are higher than ever.
I would suggest making sure that everyone on the team is provided with top-quality tools at every touch point with the customer – from design to sales to install to long-term servicing. This will force the team and make it more efficient and make the business more valuable.
SSI: Finish this sentence: 2026 will be remembered as the year that the security industry…
Carlson: … improved their software systems to serve customers more efficiently, effectively and profitably.
Click here to check out all the entries in our 2026 security industry predictions series!
