User:Nestwatcher/MVaaS

MVaaS is an acronym for Managed Video as a Service. It refers to a systems architecture used by companies that provide or enable video monitoring services, to allow them and their customers to more easily manage large numbers of digital video recorders (DVRs) or network video recorders (NVRs). In any scalable video monitoring architecture, the information about a customer’s physical locations, the video recorders and cameras at those locations, and the customer’s users, must be stored in a central database. In a traditional architecture, each customer is responsible for hosting their own database. In an MVaaS architecture, this database is managed by the video monitoring provider, not by the customer. The customer interacts with the database, and with their video recorders, using a website also managed by the video monitoring provider. Because the customer is freed from the details of hosting the database and web site, this information is sometimes said to be “in the cloud”. Indeed, the term MVaaS is intentionally similar to the well-known term SaaS, Software as a Service. The term Managed Video refers to the fact that in this architecture, the customer’s video remains on the video recorders at the customer premises and is not stored in the central database. The central database holds all the information that mediates access to this video and is important for maintaining and configuring the video recorders, but does not contain the video itself. This ensures that the customer always has ultimate control of their video, and frees the customer and the video monitoring company from having to continuously consume bandwidth to transfer video from the video recorders to the central database. Under an MVaaS architecture, additional information may be stored in the central database besides just the information about the video recorders and users. For example, the video monitoring company may store observations or comments for each camera, or a log of which camera was monitored when.

Alternative architectures
An alternative to MVaaS is Hosted Video as a Service, HVaaS. This architecture is like MVaaS, except the customer’s video is stored in the central database. Some customers prefer this because it allows them to simplify the video recorders that are on their premises.

MVaaS Providers
Arrowsight uses its own MVaaS architecture to provide video monitoring for business operations. Video observations made by Arrowsight’s staff of video auditors, or by the customers themselves, are stored in the central database along with the information about each customers video recorders and users. All data can be accessed via the Arrowsight web site, via emailed reports and automated alerts, or via Arrowsight’s Web Service API for reading and updating the data. Arrowsight is compatible with third-party DVR/NVRs. Envysion uses an MVaaS architecture to integrate video with business tools such as Point of Sale (POS), Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS), and Access Control systems. Envysion Insight can generate custom store-level and above-store reports, and send automated user-defined email alerts. Envysion uses a proprietary hybrid Network Video Recorder and has integrated to many point-of-sale systems.