The need for interoperability, which is making different types of devices or technologies communicate with one another, is certainly nothing new in our industry. It has paved the way for technological developments, while at the same time ensuring future-proof products.

Most importantly, it has been a catalyst in guiding newer trends, such as AI and IoT, into maturity. As new technologies reach this crucial point where standardization is necessary for seamless integrations, we further see the need of open standards and cooperation within the market.

At Anixter, we have been testing interoperability in our Infrastructure Solutions Lab^™ for many years, connecting devices and clients from different suppliers to our test server site to ensure that integrations and multi-supplier solutions are going to work correctly for our customers in real-world scenarios.

Due to the proprietary way that access control security components have historically been designed and manufactured, achieving interoperability between different manufacturers? products hasn?t always been easy. It sometimes has involved developing specific device drivers or creating workarounds to get readers, panels and other peripherals to share information and communicate with a common access control management platform.

A New Interface Driving Open Access Control

As a result of the proprietary nature of the access control market, customers often have remained confined to deploying single-supplier access control systems and felt forced to buy access control panels from a particular manufacturer in order to maintain their current investments in legacy card readers, door controllers and card technology.

But the industry is changing as the development of standards-based applications grows, and end users and system integrators alike are recognizing the value of open standards, such as the interoperability standards created by ONVIF.

ONVIF Profile A provides an interface for ONVIF member developers to use when developing access control software and other security products.