Bell Canada has jumped back into the home monitoring business with an announcement yesterday about a security system that is connected using Bell’s highspeed mobile wireless network with an IP-enabled interface. Clients can go online to customize their service by deciding what they want to be alerted about, who should receive alerts, and how – whether by phone, e-mail or text message. It sounds a lot like a user-configurable VoIP service.
In addition to self-monitoring, clients can also opt for response by a monitoring centre.
In late September, I wrote about the quintuple play from western Canadian telcos SaskTel and MTS, with their security products complementing voice, internet, mobile and TV services. At the time, I noted:
With the availability of low cost intelligent, pan-tilt-zoom cameras, it seems to me that there are some interesting opportunities for integration of video monitoring over high speed networks and mobile TV – perhaps a return to this space by the major carriers. It is a natural bundle with telecom services.
Sure enough, Bell’s product announcement includes:
Home Monitoring has optional video capability that allows clients to access a live video stream from their personal Web site or have images pushed to them by e-mail or to a cell phone when an alert occurs.
I continue to like the ‘stickiness’ of security systems as part of a telecom services bundle. People just don’t seem to change their monitoring companies as frequently as other services.