# Questions procurement should ask a video analytics vendor

Ayonix Video Analytics · Version 1.0 · Reviewed 11 September 2026
Author: Gabriel Bamola, Chief Marketing Officer · Technical review: Dr Sadi Vural, Founder and CEO

---

These questions are designed to separate marketing accuracy claims from
measurable site performance. Notes on what a good answer looks like are included,
and they apply to Ayonix as much as to anyone else.

## On accuracy claims

**1. What accuracy do you claim, and on which cameras was it measured?**
_Good answer:_ a refusal to give a single number without conditions, or a number
with the camera specification, angle, range, lighting and scene attached.
_Warning sign:_ a percentage with no conditions.

**2. What was the ground truth for that measurement?**
_Good answer:_ scripted tests, manual counts or stopwatch timing.
_Warning sign:_ the system's own confidence scores.

**3. Was recall measured together with false-alert rate?**
_Good answer:_ yes, always paired.
_Warning sign:_ one without the other — either can be made to look excellent alone.

**4. What is the false-alert rate expressed as?**
_Good answer:_ alerts per camera-hour.
_Warning sign:_ a percentage, which hides how many alerts an operator actually receives.

**5. In what conditions does performance degrade, and by how much?**
_Good answer:_ a specific list — heavy rain, fog, low sun, occlusion.
_Warning sign:_ "it handles all conditions".

## On cameras

**6. What are the minimum camera requirements for each analytic we want?**

**7. How do you assess whether our cameras meet them?**
_Good answer:_ a per-camera readiness review with pass/re-aim/unsuitable outcomes.

**8. What happens to cameras that fail that assessment?**
_Good answer:_ they are excluded, with the remediation cost stated.
_Warning sign:_ "we can tune around it".

**9. What pixel-on-target does a person need at the furthest point of interest?**

**10. What frame rate does the analytic actually need, as delivered?**

**11. Will you tell us before contract which of our cameras are unsuitable?**

## On false alerts

**12. What mechanisms reduce irrelevant alerts, and what do they trade away?**
_Good answer:_ an explicit acknowledgement that aggressive tuning costs recall.

**13. What residual false-alert rate should we expect on our cameras?**
_Good answer:_ "that is what the pilot measures".
_Warning sign:_ a confident number before seeing your cameras.

**14. Does anyone claim to eliminate false alarms?**
If so, treat everything else they say with corresponding caution.

## On integration

**15. What is the exact integration status with our VMS — shipped and validated,
technically possible, or a project?**

**16. Can you evidence any certification or marketplace listing you claim?**

**17. Which product tier and version have you actually integrated with?**

**18. What happens to events when the connection to the VMS is lost?**

**19. Who maintains the camera-to-entity mapping as cameras change?**

## On deployment

**20. Can this run entirely on-premise, and entirely without internet access?**

**21. What leaves our network, under what circumstances?**

**22. What continues working during a WAN outage?**

**23. How is hardware sized, and what inputs do you need from us?**
_Warning sign:_ a channel count quoted without seeing your stream profiles.

**24. What is the update mechanism, and can we hold a version?**

## On privacy and governance

**25. What exactly is processed, and what is never inferred?**

**26. Is any biometric template created?**

**27. What retention applies to event evidence, and is deletion evidenced?**

**28. If demographic estimation is offered: what is the lawful basis, what is the
error distribution across groups, and is there an anonymous alternative?**
_Good answer:_ an anonymous alternative offered first.

---

## The two questions that matter most

If you ask only two:

1. **"Which of our cameras will not work, and will you tell us before we sign?"**
2. **"What will you measure during the pilot, and who agrees the thresholds?"**

A vendor who answers both directly is describing a deployment. A vendor who
deflects both is describing a sale.

---

Questions: infojp@ayonix.com · https://videoanalytics.ayonix.com