#NoHikeyNoLikey
On Friday 4th August HikVision blocked the final legitimate UK distributor from providing us with further stocks of HikVision-branded products
We, at use-IP Ltd, first provided HikVision products in 2013, and have been until now an official HikVision sub-distributor.
We signed an official Sub-Distributor partnership agreement with them on the 21st January 2016.
In wording that the UK Competition and Markets Authority would approve of that contract asked us to:
exercise our best efforts to sell and promote the products within the territory in an aggressive and effective manner
That agreement lapsed after one year.
We were not offered an opportunity to sign a new agreement until ...
At a meeting at our office on the 12th July we were given first notice of a ‘new global strategy’ from HikVision - they will no longer allow HikVision-branded products to be sold to end-users.
In an email on the 16th July they sent us a summary of this ‘new global strategy’.
On the afternoon of Friday 21st July we received clarification that their interpretation of end-user meant that we could only sell to Trade Installers:
Do you have a definition of an ‘end-user’ please?
The end-user is who finally use the product, can be personal/residential customer/school/company and so on, I think it is easy to identify , right ?
On that same day they began to block the supply of any further product to us - just 9 days after we were first informed!
On the 23rd July HikVision’s UK Sales Manager offered to meet and discuss the matter following his return to the UK on August 6th.
At 1:45pm today, Friday 4th August, we were cut-off.
Distributors (and sub-distributors such as ourselves) can now only sell HikVision-branded products to Trade Installers.
All other customers (‘end-users’) must purchase from Trade Installers. This includes; Government, Education, Businesses, and Homeowners.
All online pricing must be put behind a login. Only Trade Installers may be allowed to have a login to see pricing of HikVision-branded products online.
A monthly report must be passed to HikVision detailing whom HikVision-branded product has been sold to in the past month.
A new budget brand, to be known as ‘HiWatch by HikVision’, will be introduced for end-users - which can be shown and sold online with prices.
From what we have been allowed to see so far, this HiWatch brand is deliberately dumbed-down to compete and win market share from longstanding budget brands such as Foscam & Swann. These are brands who have asked us to promote & sell their products in the past, but we have always declined due to their relatively poor performance.
HiWatch products will have a maximum resolution of 4MP, and will mainly use ‘ring of LEDs’ IR in place of the newer & better EXIR2 LEDs used on HikVision’s most recent cameras. They will also not use HikVision’s latest 75% more bandwidth and storage efficient h.265+ CODEC. In addition, it is of course a very limited range of just a few camera models.
It has been made clear to us that we will not even be allowed to supply further HikVision-branded products to our existing customers with existing systems, nor to fulfil open quotations that we have provided to recent enquirers.
HikVision have introduced this ‘new global strategy’ with ridiculous haste. HiWatch products are not even available in the UK yet.
We anticipate that these changes will cause their brand a lot of ill-feeling, when customers learn that they can now purchase HikVision-branded products only from Trade Installers.
HikVision have stated the following new stance on HikVision-branded products:
Hikvision products are professional surveillance products and highly technical devices. It requires substantial product knowledge for the best possible system design, installation, support, and maintenance that our customers deserve.
So only AUTHORIZED distributors and wholesalers can sell Hikvision products but can’t sell directly to end users.
It’s a challenging stance to maintain when ‘HiWatch by HikVision’ is intrinsically not different, they too are still IP cameras - just not as good.
I have no idea how they are going to attempt to justify that the new ‘EasyIP 3.0’ range was introduced earlier this year, made widely available, became popular – and now can only be sold to Trade Installers.
Furthermore, this seems an absolutely bizarre way to treat your long-standing “Authorised Reseller” partners, when currently there are over 50,000 listings for HikVision-branded products on ebay (UK only!).
I am sorry that we will no longer be able to supply you, our customers, with HikVision-branded products (after we have run-out of our current in-house stocks).
I am very disappointed at the speed and manner of the cut-off - nobody above the rank of supplier Sales Assistant has contacted us! Only then, by phone to my team here - and when challenged avoiding putting anybody up to speak to me. Absolutely incredible given the amount of HikVision business we have processed for them over the past four years.
Unfortunately, if you wish to continue to use HikVision-branded products, you must find a Trade Installer to purchase them from. I hope that you are able to find a new supplier with the knowledge & experience to offer you the sales and service support that you deserve.
We have maybe 30 NVRs and a 100 cameras remaining in local stock here - if you are an existing customer and you’d like to grab anything from our stocks, please contact us ASAP - that stock won’t last long.
If you wish to appeal HikVision’s decision to end the supply of HikVision-branded products to anybody other than Trade Installers, please send your comments to:
HikVision UK General Mgr - Jason Yang - jason.yang@hikvision.com
&
HikVision UK Sales Manager - Justin Qu - quzheng@hikvision.com
Or call their UK Head Office on 01628 902 140
An end-user whom we directed there yesterday was recommended to buy from us!
We will of course be pleased to continue to support and serve you with the full range of products from our other long-established partners in this sector, as we have done since 2008.
New enquiries will not, of course, be offered HikVision products.
We are currently actively seeking, sourcing and testing alternatives to replace the HikVision-branded range of products with top-performing products from manufacturers who would be pleased to have you as end-user customers (as I write this new 4K samples are en-route to us!).
I sincerely hope that we can continue to serve you well.
#NoHikeyNoLikey
Thanks & Best Regards,
Phil Stewkesbury
Managing Director
use-IP Ltd
3pm 4th August 2017
Please click here to register to receive our email newsletter to be kept informed
UPDATES (added 28th September 2017)
My original statement in the above pages will not be edited, but I have decided to add a few lines here to provide you with updates:
HikVision replacement cameras - https://goo.gl/ujL8oK
HikVision backdoor hacking exploit - https://goo.gl/4LbTdP
New V5.50 f/ware for HikVision’s two most recent IP camera families - https://goo.gl/2RGYjk
9th October 2017
HikVision instructed their UK distributor for the EZVIZ range of products to also stop supplying us.
11th October 2017
use-IP Ltd introduced Milesight:
Forum announcement - https://goo.gl/6qdGdq
Webshop category - https://goo.gl/SMoxVH
20th November 2017
We removed the header banner from our webshop directing people to this statement.