There are two main criteria which set the competitive landscape in the physical security business and they are scale/economics & technology/performance. In the first category the top two Chinese manufacturers of Video Surveillance equipment (Hikvision and Dahua) have during the last few years taken control here. They now dwarf their western competitors and have dramatically brought down prices; Through this they have built up scale. They have been able to do this through a protected home market, which is the largest single market in the world and in the case of Hikvision they have received massive investments and orders from the Chinese government (their benefactor and part-owner) to support rapid expansion in overseas markets. Through these advantages over western manufactures they have been able to drastically reduce prices to a level that few western manufacturers can meet profitably in the long term. There appears to be no evidence that they are selling at lower prices […]