DTiQ Focuses a Solution Around The Premise of Customizability and Adaptability

Customization for Your Business

Within the hospitality and retail industries, brands differ from one another significantly, from their operational requirements to their inventory needs and much more. The solutions that are often offered to these brands may not be designed to fit their specific business needs; however, the “one size fits all” concept doesn’t always work in today’s competitive market. Instead, every solution needs to be scalable, adaptable and customizable to fit the needs of a growing and dynamic business.

Within the realm of surveillance, “custom images” can be deployed in large scale without requiring a great deal of time and effort from technology vendors or operators. DTiQ recognized this unique opportunity many years ago and built a solution around the premise of customizability and adaptability.

Understanding the Image Process

Defining a “Custom Image”

A custom image is a set of preconfigured settings designed for a specific brand or customer. The image itself resides on the physical hard drive and consists of various layers, including the operating system, surveillance software, and configuration settings.

The operating system is Windows based. It is also hardened and secured for PCI-Compliance. All security patches and updates are installed and any unnecessary services or programs are removed from the system. The next layer consists of the Surveillance Software, which has been tested and benchmarked in a quality control phase. The image, with its many different layers, is dynamic in nature and subject to change over time as it
is always recording and updating itself. While the image may not remain completely static, the nature of the configurations settings can be controlled prior to its deployment into the field.

Design

During a pilot, DTiQ can gather a solid understanding of how a particular store operates. This includes details regarding the point-of-sale register, placement of cameras, exceptions, and other loss prevention information. Another area to consider when designing a custom image is how to mitigate potential support issues in the future. If a customer has a complex day/night schedule for all of their locations, or perhaps they have custom POS exception reports, these can be preset into the image to ensure they are setup and ready to go on day one – a “Plug-N-Play” solution essentially.

So, throughout the discovery phase, a foundation is developed for creating a set of custom settings and reports for deployment across an enterprise. This helps with the speed of deployment and also ensures that
each location is setup exactly the same way across the entire enterprise. Without a custom image, each server deployed would have to be manually configured on site – a time consuming process and also one that leaves
significant room for error.

Quality Control

Once the image is designed, it must endure an extensive quality control check, where the system is tested and probed. Information is gathered from the testing phase with either a “pass” or “fail” score. No image is ever processed if it does not receive passing scores in all categories.

Deployment

When the image is ready for deployment, it will be given to the production team where the servers go through the imaging process. After the servers receive this new “Custom Image” they will endure yet another test and quality control check before finally being shipped for deployment.

Leveraging Adaptive Solutions for Deployment

Choosing a surveillance system is a critical part of making any loss prevention decision but what should also be considered are the deployment needs of that solution. By leveraging a system that is both scalable and adaptable for enterprise wide deployment, operators can reduce deployment time and also cut costs across the entire organization. The faster the system is deployed, the sooner a return on investment will be realized.

DTiQ’s custom image ensures customers that each system will be deployed identically across their entire enterprise. Furthermore, removing the human element from the customization phase during installation reduces the risk of human error, which in turn limits any deployment issues.

In conclusion, deployment needs should always be considered when choosing a surveillance system. A “one size fits all” solution cannot work for a growing and dynamic business. The solution needs to be adaptable
and customizable and complementary to the operation. Utilizing a surveillance system such as DTiQ’s that can be tailored to meet specific business needs, will ensure continued ROI as the organization grows. Whatever
technology solution is implemented must work for the business rather than having the business work with the solution.