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EDITORIAL

Guessing games

This month we take the opportunity to look ahead to 2022 and try to predict, at what is possibly the most unpredictable of times in history, what the next twelve months has in store for the security sector

I’m not a betting man. I did once get a feeling in my water that Liverpool FC would do the treble and I put a fiver on it at 69.5-1 only for it to come off, trousering me around £350 and paying for that year’s holiday. Despite that correct prediction landing me a nice wad it didn’t lead me to the opinion that I was some kind of seer, so when it comes to making annual predictions on the direction of the security sector each year I prefer to defer to the real experts. Which is why this month we see the return of the PSI Panel and a collection of industry gurus being interviewed giving us their thoughts on the twelve months ahead and the technologies that may shape the direction of innovation in 2022.

I don’t envy the experts on this one. These are tricky times to be making guesses on what the next year could hold. We saw events in 2020 that no-one on the entire planet predicted at the end of 2019. National lockdowns and social distancing led to the demise of many businesses, meanwhile working from home and the word ‘furlough’ became commonplace. In fact there are still plenty of people working remotely and lots of workers preferring to ‘Zoom’ rather than drive.

An additional factor is that recent events have also proven to be divisive amongst populations with sides being taken across a number of subjects from climate change to self-identity. Throw into that mix the impact of chip shortages and the continuation of the pandemic and there are plenty of things to consider for making bold statements on the future and who to blame for where we are; there are some who blame everything, even empty shelves in US stores on Brexit, for example.

Fortunately, as I’ve said before, we work in a sector that provides a common requirement of human life. People will always need security and new technology never stops being innovated and developed. The recent sights of trade shows and regional events suggests that the sector may be slowly returning to prepandemic times, but which technologies will survive and subsequently thrive after all we’ve been through to go on and make it big in the shows of 2022? Can trends be confidently surmised? Next year could well prove to be the year of noncontact access, AI, cloud, business acquisitions and shortages, to name but a few possible outcomes. Check out the Panel feature to find out what the experts say.

I always like compiling the year-end edition of PSI as we carry so many interviews and opinions on how our market could evolve. I hope you enjoy reading all of the predictions and pick up some tips on which innovations could lead the way.

Andy Clutton

EDITOR