One of our biggest transitions happened in July of this year, when HiveWatch completed our private beta phase and made the HiveWatch® Operating System™ publicly available after much anticipation and hard work. We launched our product to serve the physical security industry, and it’s already improving the way security teams consolidate disparate systems, utilize video and access control data to reduce false alarms, and transform their processes and security programs. The program-level efficiencies gained are unparalleled to anything our clients have seen to date.
Here’s just a snippet of how the HiveWatch platform is changing the game for our customers:
"We launched our product to serve the physical security industry, and it’s already improving the way security teams consolidate disparate systems, utilize video and access control data to reduce false alarms, and transform their processes and security programs. The program-level efficiencies gained are unparalleled to anything our clients have seen to date."
Our company is still in its infancy, but we’re pretty excited to see our impact on the industry already. HiveWatch was named in the Top 30 Technology Innovations of 2022 by Security Sales and Integration, and was honored in the SecurityInfoWatch Reader’s Choice Awards for “Best Business Management Software & Solutions” after more than 1,650 security professionals participated in voting. And, perhaps our favorite award, GIPS Insights named us for having the “Best Conference Party”, noting our after-hours GSX soiree at Ponce City Market.
Another huge step we took as a company was moving into our new headquarters in El Segundo, CA in May. Spanning over 25k square feet, our HQ is an impressive 360° office space that is perfect for our team to grow into as our numbers continue to expand. This space was thoughtfully designed for collaboration and team brainstorming, with writable surfaces as walls and specific breakout areas throughout the office for group conversations or focused work. I firmly believe the future of work is hybrid and this space was designed to facilitate maximum collaboration, ideation, and creativity. We’ll be hosting our first industry get-together on February 8 if you want to come see it for yourself!
In June, we also had our first ever company All-Hands meeting in this brand new office space, where all of our remote workers had the opportunity to visit for a week of updates, collective goal-setting, cross-functional team meetings, and activities and dinners. Many of our remote team members had only met on Zoom, and there is no replacement for in-person time together.
In terms of company size, we were able to ramp up our hiring this year and grew our team by 98% - almost doubling our team size! We saw the biggest growth in our sales, customer success, engineering and product teams. Our customer success team increased by 233%, engineering by 83%, product increased by 500%, and sales team by 500%. We’re expecting to expand our team numbers even more in the coming year, to better innovate on our software offerings and serve our customers. (Be sure to follow us on LinkedIn to see our latest job postings.)
I’m proud to say that at HiveWatch, we prioritize initiatives to give back to the community and support employees’ efforts in community service.
This year, we were able to gather as a team and host a Day of Service at the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, raise over $5,000 for the Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation during the Malibu Half Marathon, and fulfill childrens’ holiday wish lists as we participated in the “Uplift with a Gift” Campaign for disadvantaged families, organized by the Children’s Law Center of California.
Lastly, HiveWatch had the opportunity to partner with IOBSE (International Organization for Black Security Executives) in 2022 and hosted a session at their annual conference, kicking off a partnership with them to sponsor future conferences. We are also launching an internship program with IOBSE beginning in 2023, an initiative we’re excited about to help bring more diverse voices and perspectives to the physical security industry.
As we look forward to the major goals and steps for next year, HiveWatch is focusing on scaling the company, not just in terms of employee size, but in regards to infrastructure and how we can best support our customers.
In 2023 and beyond, we’re focusing heavily on areas that further differentiate the HiveWatch platform and better facilitate our customers’ ability to streamline their processes, and do more with less. As we see the effects of company layoffs and the economic downturn, HiveWatch’s platform will prove to be a valuable tool for security teams who have to operate on leaner budgets and workforces, and we want to keep building a product that solves the most pressing problems and keeps the needs of physical security teams in mind.
Thank you for a great year to all of our HiveWatch clients and customers, physical security colleagues, and partners. We look forward to continuing to work together with you, and we’re excited to share what we have launching in 2023 and after.