Cost of Ownership in Security

As consumers, most of our purchases have a one-time cost. Groceries, clothing, almost any physical good, etc. You pay for it once and then it’s yours. Most goods have little cost of ownership beyond the initial price tag. Cost of ownership takes in the initial purchase cost as well as the costs of operation. It looks at the bigger picture beyond the first payout to obtain the item and looks at its value over time.

Two large purchases that most of us have experienced that have continual cost of ownership are cars and houses. I have never bought a house, but I do own my car. It is currently sitting at my mechanic’s shop getting its brakes looked at. Cars are a great example to showcase the cost of ownership because it is easy to trace that cost. I purchased my car outright several years ago, but I still have to pay to get value from it. I have to pay for gas, oil changes, new tires, and (hopefully not) new brakes. Since I want to make my car last until the end of the world, I know I will pay for car washes, gas and oil, new windshields, window motors, and more in the future. The value I gain from my car is that it allows me to get to and from work, go to movies and restaurants, run to the grocery, and more. In short, it gets me places. In order to continue to get this value from my car, I need to pay for regular maintenance and fuel. If I stop paying, I stop getting the value from my car. A car just sitting in the garage doesn’t help me.

Paying for a house has a similar cost of ownership. You don’t just put the down payment on your house and enjoy it for the rest of your life. Rather you have to pay for the mortgage, electricity, gas, water, and more. You have to pay to repair the AC when it breaks during a record heatwave, and you have to pay if a pipe bursts during the winter.

Like a car or a house, a security system has a continual cost of ownership irrevocably tied to it. The cost of ownership for a surveillance system goes beyond just the initial installation fees. Instead, it includes all of the costs associated with maintenance, service, and replacement. Cameras will break or become outdated. A video management system (VMS) requires regular updates to keep it functioning properly. Even the best surveillance camera will eventually need repairs and updates because of everyday wear and tear. This is even higher when the cameras are outdoors and exposed to the elements.

When you partner with LiveView Technologies, you don’t have to worry about the upkeep, repairs, and updates. Rather, you get a professional security camera system, and we worry about maintaining the system for you. We proactively monitor our units so we know exactly what is going on with each one. In fact, our units have self-healing processes as well as health analytics so we know its exact uptime and if there is a problem that requires attention.

IT is expensive. It is expensive to create an on-premises VMS and even more expensive when you have to replace outdated hardware that no longer functions with new software. LVT helps mitigate this cost of ownership as well. Because we function with a cloud-based VMS, you don’t have to worry about installing software updates or purchasing new hardware that will work with those updates. We handle all of the updates and make sure your units are functioning properly. Furthermore, we make sure each camera in our fleet is up-to-date and works as it should.

At LVT, we remove a large portion of the cost of ownership from you. That way you can focus on what you do best, whether that is retail, construction, or law enforcement.