Transforming for a More Secure Future Long Before Industry Disruption Became a Buzzword, Ademco Was Already Changing the Status Quo

12 LEADERS OF TRANSFORMATION LEADERS OF TRANSFORMATION 13 ADEMCO SECURITY GROUP Transforming for a more secure future Long before industry disruption became a buzzword, Ademco was already changing the status quo. Its initiatives included doing away with hard-copy paperwork and bringing in an autonomous security robot. VER the last four decades, Ademco Security monitoring and command centre in Outram, which Group has been a pioneer in Singapore’s se- includes an in-house data centre. O curity sector in many ways. In the specially-cooled area, rows of data receiv- It launched a 24-hour central monitoring system ers and servers hum away. To prevent its operations in 1985, and installed the first alarms in Housing and from being disrupted in a case of power failure, Development Board (HDB) lifts during that decade. Ademco has its own generator, housed in a purpose- In 2003, it introduced the country’s first internet built room. protocol-based alarm transmission system, and last The firm also has a separate data centre and disas- year, it brought in an autonomous patrol robot. ter recovery centre, located in the east of the island. Yet despite being at the cutting edge in these ar- In contrast to this high-tech set-up, however, is the eas, Ademco did not find it easy to make a modest story of its internal transformation in 2010. internal change – moving from hard-copy reports to Previously, hard-copy paperwork was central to a fully digital system in 2010. Ademco’s operations. In transforming a firm, “the human factor is prob- When employees attended to an alarm call, for in- ably the biggest challenge”, says Ademco group stance, a report would have to be filled out and the managing director Toby Koh. “You’re going to have client would have to sign off. the naysayers.” Back in the office, the information would then have to be manually entered into Ademco’s com- INDUSTRY LEADER, INTERNAL RELUCTANCE puter system. Ademco was incorporated in Singapore in 1977 as For the sake of greater efficiency, things had to the regional headquarters of Ademco USA. The Sin- change. On the surface, this seemed simple. There gapore entity’s first managing director T C Koh – Mr was no need to develop new solutions. Koh’s father – bought out the firm in 1985. Instead, Ademco just had to adopt off-the-shelf Long before industry disruption became a buzz- customer relationship management software and word, Ademco was already changing the status quo. equip the operations team with tablets. In the early 1980s, Singapore’s fire service han- Yet such changes are easier said than done. For a dled its own calls. But in 1985, Ademco stepped in start, the upfront cost can be daunting, particularly with the idea of providing fire alarm monitoring for an SME. Thankfully, the frontline staff – technicians and en- started out in a tentative, almost reluctant fashion. Ademco group MD Toby Koh system services. “You’ve got to be prepared to invest,” says Mr Koh. gineers – were much keener on the idea. “There wasn’t really that thought: ‘Let’s go out of overseeing the operations at the control room. The The privatisation of this service – which had to be And not everyone at the management level may be “It helps them,” he points out. “They don’t have to Singapore’. We were actually led by our customers,” company has expanded approved by Parliament – allowed the fire service to prepared, especially if the traditional methods have come back to the office to file reports, they can just recalls Mr Koh. to Indonesia, India, China focus on fighting fires. been working thus far. send it in from the site.” When clients went abroad, they would often request and Vietnam, and wants its overseas presence to account Today, Ademco has over half the local market in fire “You have those who are a bit more old-school,” And as a bonus, the move meant that Ademco could for Ademco’s services in their overseas locations too. for more than half of annual alarm monitoring. It also monitors alarms for a wide he admits. But in the face of resistance, he “basically do its bit for the environment, saving an estimated 40 Initially, Ademco fulfilled these on an ad hoc proj- revenue by 2020. variety of other facilities, from banks to warehouses. forced it through”, convinced that the change would to 50 “20-foot trees” each year, Mr Koh adds. ect basis, finding partners in the relevant countries BT PHOTO: SYAMIL SAPARI Making this possible is the firm’s 24-hour central be good for Ademco. Similarly, Ademco’s overseas expansion journey for each project. Then, some clients said they needed 14 LEADERS OF TRANSFORMATION LEADERS OF TRANSFORMATION 15 Ademco to have a formal entity on the ground in or- ers – still deploy security guards in the same old fash- der to award projects. ion, there’s not going to be any improvement.” So in 2010, Ademco finally made the leap and in- Rather than spending their time on mundane pa- corporated in Malaysia and the Philippines. trols, guards should be freed up to do “higher value- Since then, it has expanded to Indonesia, India, added work” such as investigating alerts, he argues. China – in a joint venture with a local player – and in The basic patrolling can be done by robots in- 2018, Vietnam. stead. Indeed, with the appropriate sensors and And in a departure from its initial reluctance, the software, a robot can arguably do a better job than aim now is for Ademco’s overseas presence to ac- a human at night, when facing low light conditions, count for more than half of annual revenue by 2020. says Mr Koh. In 2015, Ademco’s progress was recognised when Nor do robots suffer fatigue. And although auto- the firm was named one of the winners of the Enter- mated, they do not go on “autopilot” – simply going prise 50 awards. through the motions – the way a tired or bored hu- Organised by The Business Times and KPMG, the man guard might. annual awards honour Singapore's 50 most enter- While waiting for robot patrols to catch on, Adem- prising privately-held local companies. co continues to lead its clients forward in other ways. The firm sees itself as offering not just security solu- SECURING THE FUTURE tions, but also an overall boost to their clients’ opera- Going digital has improved efficiency of Ademco staff Originally led overseas by its clients, Ademco is now tional efficiency, says Mr Koh. waiting for customers to catch up on other fronts. He relates the example of a client in the manufac- WHEN Maung Maung Ye Htut started working overview of what needs to be addressed, as well as In 2017, the firm brought in an autonomous secu- turing industry, which Ademco was supplying with for Ademco in 2007, it was much more of an the relevant details. rity robot that can conduct patrols on its own. Rented smartcards for security access. “analog” world. Without this, customer service staff would out on a “robot-as-a-service” basis, the four-wheeled When Mr Koh visited the factory premises in In- As a service technician, he would go down to sites have had to call the service team to relay such contraption is particularly suited for patrols that take donesia, he was invited to have lunch in the com- to address issues. Back then, closed-circuit television information. Says Ms Lim: “I could have spent 15 place in unmanned areas or during late hours, says pany canteen. (CCTV) cameras were still “simple analog cameras”, minutes on the phone just trying to tell him what Mr Koh. There, he noticed that the workers were using pa- unconnected to the internet, he recalls: “When was going on.” Yet deployment has been “very limited” so far, per coupons to redeem their canteen meals. There we needed to change one, we just took it out and It is easy for her to field questions from customers with most runs having been done as a proof-of-con- was even a wall of paper punchcards which the changed it.” on the spot, since she can retrieve information from cept, he admits. workers used to clock in and out. Technology has since moved on. With CCTV the system immediately. Given Singapore’s shortage of security officers, he Surprised by the persistence of these manual sys- networks now connected and online, today’s service The system’s history log also allows recurring hopes that this will change. tems, he offered to incorporate these functions into technicians require both electrical engineering skills problems to be spotted early, she adds. Much has been said about improving the skills and the smartcards instead. and IT know-how, he says. For Zailan bin Zohri, 30, moving from his working conditions of guards, he notes. In the canteen, the resulting digital trail would Yet in other aspects, the job has become easier. previous workplace to Ademco in 2016 was like Yet the nature of the job has not changed fundamen- make it easier to audit staff meals, and save the need Says the 40-year-old, who is now a team leader: travelling through time. “Ademco is much more tally: “So long as people – property owners and manag- for printing and cutting paper coupons. “I’ve seen a lot of improvements and changes.” advanced,” he says. “I was very surprised by this Similarly, staff monitoring would be more efficient In the past, “everything was manually documented”. new environment change.” and greener without the need for paper punchcards.

Load more