The 2016 Olympics is set to take place in Rio de Janeiro from 5 to 21 August. This comes two years after the FIFA football World Cup. From the security industry’s perspective, both these sporting events have helped the market demand to varying degrees.
The 2016 Olympics is set to take place in Rio de Janeiro from 5 to 21 August. This comes two years after the FIFA football World Cup. From the security industry’s perspective, both these sporting events have helped the market demand to varying degrees.
“Olympic Games has increased tourism and the need of new and improved security systems in airports, city surveillance, transportation systems, Olympics stadiums, athlete villages and hotels,” said Felipe Arguello, Regional Sales Director – Latin America at
Arecont Vision. “We have seen an important increase in the last five years in hotel constructions, with over 70 new hotels in the area of Barra da Tijuca in Rio de Janeiro, where 50 percent of these new lodging facilities will be 4 to 5-Star facilities requiring internationally approved security systems. New security systems have been deployed in the Olympic Stadiums and Athlete lodging areas.”
Bruce Wu, GM of Dahua Brasil at
Dahua Technology added that the Olympic Games are seen as a good opportunity for the company and that the investment is more significant than those seen during the world cup two years ago.
“Dahua has already won the main parts of the Olympic project in Rio 2016 for surveillance and we believe Brazilian government will continue invest more for the safety in whole country,” Wu said. “Comparing with football world cup two years ago, Olympic games have more influence power worldwide.”
However, not everyone is of the same opinion. Jose Garcia, Marketing Director for Hikvision Latam at
Hikvision Digital Technology opined that contrary to expectations the Olympic Games did not help increase demand. There has been some development in the city of Rio, but stiff economic conditions and currency devaluation has hurt the prospects elsewhere.
“In contrast of what we would think of, the Olympic Games did not impact the demand drastically,” Garcia said. “Despite the demand has increased in Rio de Janeiro, where the Olympic Games will be held, but not for the rest of the country. On top of that, due to the Brazilian currency devaluation, there are no significant growth figures over the last years coming from this event, compared with the World Cup, where Brazil enjoyed of a great economy situation and the growth figures were more visible.”
Victor Merino, Vice President for LASA at
Pelco by Schneider Electric gave two major reasons for Olympic Games not making as much an impact as the World Cup, stressing on the limitations of the venue.
“First, the Summer Olympics are only taking place in Rio de Janeiro, which limits the necessity of security countrywide,” Merino said. “Second, most of the largest projects have been assigned to the official sponsors of the games, so the impact on the demand for companies who are not taking a large role in sponsorships is limited.”