By Scott Goldfine
scott.goldfine@bobit.com
An intriguing market development in these tough economic times is fleshed out in Security Sales & Integration 's fourth annual Systems Integrator Study. The survey results show a majority of companies, based on size, are grouping in the middle echelon. Fewer companies now populate near the bottom rung, and same goes for the top ranks. Hence, among the companies that seem to be struggling it appears mostly to be the small systems integration operations or the real big fish.
Although cost control is being aided by stagnant wages, the rise in more sophisticated networked and integrated systems that is boosting the middle of the pack also appears to be besetting smaller companies, while higher overhead is hamstringing the larger firms. Among other findings, service/maintenance is the No. 1 revenue generator, which shows integrators are focusing on that revenue stream at a time when the economy is slowing and there are fewer new installation projects.
Nearly 110 of the nation's leading security systems integrators participated in the in-depth 2008 survey, which consisted of 63 questions. This year SSI will present the study in two installments with numerous graphs and captions detailing the current climate of today's systems integration business.