Heather Klotz-Young

Relentless Growth

SDM profiles the recipients of the sixth annual CSAA Excellence Awards.

August 15, 2011

Every year companies across the country take the time to fill out applications for the Central Station Alarm Association (CSAA) Excellence Awards. Central stations, managers, operators, and support staff all take on the challenge of communicating who they are and what they do so well — in an application.

SDM in the Field: SecurityXchange - Day 3

Heather Klotz-Young

August 10, 2011

Today at SecurityXchange in Park City, Utah, I had the chance to sit down with Matt Spencer, SecurityXchange’s founder and the chief operating officer of VerticalXchange, SecurityXchange’s parent company. We had a chance to discuss the event and its 10-year anniversary this year.

Carmageddon vs. Carmaheaven

Heather Klotz-Young

August 9, 2011

Planning and communication took L.A.’s “Carmageddon” from a potentially disastrous main event to a successful non-event. The security industry does the same thing every day.

SDM in the Field: SecurityXchange - Day 2

Heather Klotz-Young

August 8, 2011

Today at SecurityXchange in Park City, Utah, I participated as a guest guide at the event. Throughout the day, integrators, manufacturers, and end users hold meetings in the manufacturers’/service providers’ suites throughout the property, and guides are responsible for escorting the integrators and end users from meeting to meeting and keeping them on time.

SDM in the Field: SecurityXchange - Day 1

Heather Klotz-Young

August 7, 2011

This week I am in picturesque Park City, Utah for the annual event, SecurityXchange, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. When traveling to industry events, it is always interesting to see who ends up driving you to your event. This trip I had the pleasure of making the hour drive from the Salt Lake City International Airport with a driver who had a bone to pick with me about a new security system being implemented at the Salt Lake City International Airport.

Go Figure

Heather Klotz-Young

August 1, 2011

So a few hours after posting my blog entry on the RMR potential of identity theft protection services and the sobering new research numbers showing a massive escalation in breached personal data, I walked out to my mailbox and got a little reminder of the incidental, randomness of life.

Scary Numbers Still Point to Opportunity

Heather Klotz-Young

August 1, 2011

Right now, I am researching and writing the September cover story for SDM on new, even surprising, RMR opportunities in the industry. There are definitely a lot of viable, valuable opportunities. Today I saw some research numbers that were both sobering and supportive of an RMR opportunity I’ve frequently heard about while researching RMR opportunities: identity protection.

Expanding the Playbook

Multi-criteria technology is giving the fire alarm industry a powerful attack in the fight against false alarms

Heather Klotz-Young

July 19, 2011

When a team is repeatedly getting beat by a powerful player, an adaptive defense will often switch to a double team or even collapse into a triple team at times. It is a useful concept as there is strength in numbers. False alarms are an exasperating adversary in fire detection.

On Top of Your Game

Heather Klotz-Young

Laura Stepanek

June 22, 2011

How to stay at the top of your game? Stay attuned to change, specifically to game changer technology platforms, including the ones discussed in this article, that are poised to take security from ‘what it is’ to ‘what it will be.’ Almost everyone has heard a version of Isaac Asimov’s famous quote, “The only constant is change,” which is a translated version of a quote by Heraclitus, a 500 B.C. Greek philosopher.

Full Steam Ahead

For the 4th year, Axis Communications hosted the members of its A&E program at an annual technology summit.

Heather Klotz-Young

June 22, 2011

We only install IP,” keynote Domenic Flores, senior project manager for Royal Caribbean Cruise LTD, Miami, bluntly said while discussing the cruise lines’ security philosophy at the Axis A&E Technology Summit 2011. Flores’ presentation illustrated one simple message from Axis Communications Inc., Chelmsford, Mass., and its technology partners during the summit — IP adoption continues to move full steam ahead with stronger business value and a rapidly falling price tag that matches the added features and functionality IP-based systems offer.