A big focus of Commercial Integrator’s recent Deep Dive on AV-over-IP was to gauge where the acceptance point is at for the technology that, not long ago, seemed to be difficult for many AV integration firms to embrace.
Our research shows that in 2019 typical AV integration firms have clear confidence that AV-over-IP is the right signal distribution approach for some of their customers. Again, this is a significant change from a few years ago when typical AV integration firms wanted to keep their customers’ IT networks at arm’s length. [related]The fact that only 20% of surveyed integrators say they aren’t ready to fully embrace AV-over-IP while another quarter are moving cautiously toward embracing AV-over-IP shows real momentum.
It’s probably no coincidence that, in the same survey, 47% of integrators indicate that the typical AV networking technology decision maker within their customers’ organizations is somebody from the IT department.
Indeed, this is nothing new for IT professionals who have watched convergence across many product categories beyond AV, points out Dave Valentukonis, technical services group leader, North America, for The Siemon Company.
Window in AV-over-IP Adoption
The Siemon Company is a provider of IT infrastructure solutions and services for data centers, intelligent buildings and enterprise LANs. As such, it gets a window into companies that are evolving to adopt more AV-over-IP system designs for their customers.
“We’re seeing more AV folks introducing themselves into the structured cabling market that maybe weren’t there before,” Valentukonis says.
“We’re seeing more AV folks introducing themselves into the structured cabling market that maybe weren’t there before,” Valentukonis says.
There are a lot of technology trends, not just AV, driving the adoption, he says. “AV isn’t the only technology converting to IP,” he says. “We’ve seen it with wireless access points, security cameras, access control systems, intelligent building systems, remote PoE lighting systems [and more].”
In terms of the uptick in AV-over-IP, “I think more people are trying to get a little bit more of that network control and trying to get as much off of some of those proprietary devices used at the ends of these AV systems – and moving on to a structure that’s already in place for a number of technologies. So I think this is going to be a year where [AV-over-IP] is going to be much more prevalent.”
Watch Valentukonis’s full interview above.
