Perhaps the best indicator that the on-officer camera is an idea whose time has come is that business journals are now producing whole articles about the market gains of the companies that provide them. TASER International, Digital Ally, and GoPro have all seen dramatic gains in their valuations as the police surveillance market quietly begins to pick up momentum. Pending Congressional approval, one key driver of this potential windfall will be a new funding initiative from the Obama administration to provide $263 million to improve community relations with police through cameras.
While the crystal ball deep inside ExtremeTech’s technology bunker wasn’t designed for picking stock winner’s, we can provide some analysis of the products already in use by police forces across the country. Between TASER and another company called VieVu, over 70,000 cameras have already been sold to 5000 police agencies. The new funding would potentially equip an additional 50,000 officers with video capability, as well as training in exactly how this new technology should be used.
