ADT Security Services
Encyclopedia
ADT Security Services, originally American District Telegraph, now also known as simply ADT, is a division of Tyco International
Tyco International
Tyco International Ltd. is a highly diversified global manufacturing company incorporated in Switzerland, with United States operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey...

 and a worldwide supplier of electronic security systems
Burglar alarm
Burglar , alarms are systems designed to detect unauthorized entry into a building or area. They consist of an array of sensors, a control panel and alerting system, and interconnections...

, fire alarm systems, communication systems, and integrated building management systems
Building Management System
A Building Management System is a computer-based control system installed in buildings that controls and monitors the building’s mechanical and electrical equipment such as ventilation, lighting, power systems, fire systems, and security systems...

.

History

There were many small telegraph delivery companies in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 in the 19th century. In 1874, 57 district telegraph delivery companies affiliated and became "American District Telegraph". With the increase in telephone usage in the late 19th century, ADT's messenger business slowly declined in popularity. ADT tried branching out and developing their signaling business while still maintaining their telegraph business as primary income source.
ADT incorporated into Western Union
Western Union
The Western Union Company is a financial services and communications company based in the United States. Its North American headquarters is in Englewood, Colorado. Up until 2006, Western Union was the best-known U.S...

 in 1901. ADT separated its messenger business from its main signaling business at this time. In 1909, Western Union and ADT came under the control of AT&T
AT&T
AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services...

. ADT began to expand into new areas such as fire alarms and burglar alarm
Burglar alarm
Burglar , alarms are systems designed to detect unauthorized entry into a building or area. They consist of an array of sensors, a control panel and alerting system, and interconnections...

s between 1910 and 1930, but was kept separate from AT&T's Holmes alarm business. ADT became a publicly owned company
Public company
This is not the same as a Government-owned corporation.A public company or publicly traded company is a limited liability company that offers its securities for sale to the general public, typically through a stock exchange, or through market makers operating in over the counter markets...

 in the 1960s.

In 1964, ADT was found to be a monopoly in restraint of trade
Restraint of trade
Restraint of trade is a common law doctrine relating to the enforceability of contractual restrictions on freedom to conduct business. In an old leading case of Mitchell v Reynolds Lord Smith LC said,...

. It was shown to provide almost 80% of the central station alarm service in the United States. In some cities, such as New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 and Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....

, they were the sole provider. They were also found to have forced out of business competitors by lowering prices below cost. They would charge national accounts very low prices in cities with competitors and much higher prices where no competition was available. ADT was forced to adopt a national price list, which could not be varied, to help establish Central Station Competitors in cities without competition, and to pay fines and triple damages to the federal government, customers, and local competitors.

In 1977, the UK's Lord Ashcroft had bought under-performing outdoor equipment maker Hawley Goodall, and transformed it through acquisition into a business services group, registered in Bermuda
Bermuda
Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...

. In the early part of 1987, Hawley bought the Indianapolis
Indianapolis
Indianapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Indiana, and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population is 839,489. It is by far Indiana's largest city and, as of the 2010 U.S...

-based Crime Control Inc., fourth largest company in the U.S. security market, for $50 million. Later in the year, it bought ADT. This purchase transformed Hawley into the leading security services business in the United States, and resulted in the majority of its revenues coming from the North American market. As a result of the acquisition, Hawley changed its name to ADT Inc. and decided to refocus its business around security services. At the end of 1987, the company sold its North American-based facility services business to Denmark's ISS A/S
ISS A/S
ISS was founded in Copenhagen, Denmark in 1901 and has since grown to become one of the leading Facility Services companies in the world. ISS offers a wide range of services within the following business areas: cleaning services, support services, property services, catering services, security...

.

By the mid 1990s, ADT surpassed the 1 million customer milestone. In 1997, ADT was purchased by Tyco
Tyco International
Tyco International Ltd. is a highly diversified global manufacturing company incorporated in Switzerland, with United States operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey...

 by means of a reverse takeover
Reverse takeover
A reverse takeover or reverse merger is the acquisition of a public company by a private company so that the private company can bypass the lengthy and complex process of going public...

, thus allowing Tyco a Bermudan tax status. Lord Ashcroft joined the board of Tyco, although he had quickly disposed of a large amount of his Tyco stock taken in payment for the purchase of ADT.

In May 2010, ADT acquired competitor Broadview Security for $2.0 billion dollars. Broadview's services were transitioned to the existing ADT brand.

During March 2011, ADT opened a $1.5 million integrated solutions center (ISC) in Colorado. The ISC is more than 6500 square feet (603.9 m²) and features three show rooms open to the public. The purpose of the ISC is to educate the public on home security systems.

On September 19, 2011, Tyco announced that it would split into three companies, ADT being one of the three.

ADT in the UK

ADT first entered the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 in the late 1950s with the establishment of Electric Protection Services Limited based in London and introduced central monitoring in the mid-60s at the request of several leading banks, despite not opening a central monitoring station of their own. The 1970s and 80s brought steady growth.

In the mid 1990s, ADT Inc was acquired by Tyco International at the same time Tyco also bought up the UK firm Thorn Security. In 1997, ADT Fire and Security plc was formed from the merger of three of the UK’s largest security firms: ADT, Thorn Security and Modern Security Systems.

Operations today

ADT provides monitored burglar, fire and video surveillance systems. ADT has branches in 50 different countries, with over 62,000 employees. ADT had gross revenue of $8 billion in 2008.

ADT has branches covering the United States, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 and Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

, as well as 21 countries in Europe. ADT UK and Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

 has 23 branches employing around 5,500 people. ADT Europe has annual gross revenues of at least $2.6 Billion. ADT has branches in seven Asian countries, one branch in South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

, and branches in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 and New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

.

ADT is the largest security company in the United States, serving over 8.3 million customers. As of 2004 ADT holds 35% market share of the North American market. and has eight monitoring stations, six in the United States and two in Canada.

ADT is the UK’s leading security company, helping to protect over 250,000 UK family homes and 160,000 businesses across the country. ADT UK has also a specialist vehicle division tasked to create and maintain CCTV and riot control vehicles for police forces around the country.

In 1989 ADT Fire and Security was granted a 45 year contract to maintain the security of the British and American Governments.

ADT dealers

ADT Security also has an authorized dealer program. Under this program, independent dealers offer security system installations which are then monitored by ADT. Some ADT Authorized Dealers use similar Honeywell/Ademco products as installed by ADT, while other dealers utilize GE/ITI or DSC products.

Whether a customer purchases ADT monitoring services directly from ADT or through an authorized dealer, a 36-month monitoring contract is required, except in California, where the term is 24 months.

Legal Difficulties

ADT was successfully sued by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission on 2007 for violations of the Telemarketing Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act and was required to pay $2 million to settle the charges. ADT subsidiary Alarm King and Direct Security Services were similarly charged and paid from $20,000 to $25,000.

Products and services

  • Home Security Systems (including Fire and Life Safety)
  • Custom Home Security Systems (including Fire and Life Safety)
  • Home Health and Companion Systems
  • Home Video Surveillance
  • Small Business Intrusion Detection
  • Small Business Video Surveillance
  • Small Business Electronic Access Control
  • Medium & Large Business Intrusion Detection
  • Medium & Large Business Fire & Life Safety
  • Medium & Large Business Video Surveillance
  • Medium & Large Business Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)
  • Medium & Large Business Electronic Access Control
  • Medium & Large Business Electronic Article Surveillance and Smart Electronic Article Surveillance
  • Medium & Large Business Preferred Services
  • Medium & Large Business Security Monitoring Services
  • Medium & Large Business ADT Select Solutions
  • Medium & Large Business ADT Advanced Integration
  • Medium & Large Business Store Business Intelligence
  • Medium & Large Business ADT Anti-Skim ATM Security Solutions
  • Government Access Control
  • Government Fire & Life Safety
  • Government Intrusion Detection and Control
  • Government CCTV & Surveillance
  • Government Executive Protection
  • Government Security System Integration and Design
  • Government Public Warning/ Mass Notification Systems
  • Building Management Systems

Acquisition of Broadview Security

In early 2010,Tyco International
Tyco International
Tyco International Ltd. is a highly diversified global manufacturing company incorporated in Switzerland, with United States operational headquarters in Princeton, New Jersey...

 announced that it was acquiring Brink's Home Security Holdings, (operating as Broadview Security) and was merging the company with its ADT brand name in a transaction valued at $2.0 billion. The transaction, which was finalized and closed mid 2010, combined the #1 and #2 security companies in North America, adding Broadview's 1.3 million customer accounts and $565 million in annual recurring revenue to ADT's existing customer base of 7.4 million accounts and $7 billion in annual recurring revenue.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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