It’s All About the Connectors

Sharon Watson writing at Security Squared outlines the criteria integrators and their clients use when picking a PSIM platform.

“The first thing we look for is what integrations already exist; that’s the big one,” said Steve Rogers, vice president, LANAIR Group, Los Angeles, Calif., which implemented a PSIM solution from Proximex at Port of Long Beach.

“Getting all those systems to plug in and relate events is a major, major piece of work,” said Greg Thornbury, vice president, SecureNet, a Carollton, Texas-based integrator researching PSIM solutions. His clients in oil/gas, petrochemical and finance sectors tend to have old versions of major systems as well as homegrown applications. His question for PSIM vendors is who they connect with and how.

“The value of the product is in the hooks,” said Ayal Vogel, vice president, sales and marketing for Safeguards Technology, Hackensack, N.J., which has worked with Mer Inc., Fair Lawn, N.J., to date. “The value increases by the number of connectors that are preexisting,” he said.

C3 Fusion uses it’s Unified System Connection Protocol (USCP™) to connect to security subsystems.  USCP is a unique bi-directional messaging system that allows for interface with fusion snap-on connector services completely outside of C3 Fusion’s core software. The connectors provide continuous network integrity testing, and buffering for lossless network fault recovery. Connector Development Kits (CDKs) make USCP available to third party developers.

A successful PSIM application must be able to support a variety of connections including legacy and industry specific custom subsystems to the latest in physical security devices.