The security inspection market in MEA is expected to grow from US$ 594.9 million in 2019 to US$ 935.2 million by 2027; it is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 6.2% from 2020 to 2027.
Increasing demand for real-time threat detection to offer much safer environment in airports, railway stations, country borders, and other crowed places is influencing the investment in technologies such as artificial intelligence by major market players. For instance, Gatekeeper Security, Inc. has developed artificial intelligence powered vehicle inspection security for screening vehicles across various industries such as energy, and transportation amongst others to detect threat in real-time and take action accordingly. The solutions enable under vehicle inspection, automatic number plate reader, and 360? vehicle scanning capabilities to ensure no threat across the facilities and the vehicles. Therefore, rise in investment in technology is expected to fuel the growth of the MEA security inspection market. Also, the advent of automate security scanners are contributing to the growth of the MEA security inspection market.
In terms of product type, the others segment is expected to be the fastest growing segment in the MEA security inspection market during the forecast period. The others segment includes inspection of area and compounds as whole rather than screening people and cargos. It includes explosive, drug trace, and radioactive detection, among others. Security inspection systems are highly adopted across these events not only to ensure safety of important people attending the same, but also to maintain privacy regarding the agenda of event. Thus, the adoption of the security screening and scanning systems across private and public sectors is influencing the growth of the security inspection market in the region.
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is having a terrible effect on MEA. Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, South Africa, and the UAE are among the countries with high number of COVID-19 confirmed cases and deaths. The economic and industrial growth of these countries has been affected negatively in the past few months. The region comprises several growing economies such as the UAE, which are prospective markets for security inspection market owing to the presence of diverse customer base for electronics and semiconductor industries. The COVID-19 pandemic would have significant effects the economies, but the region is anticipated to be impacted as there is already pressure on economy of various oil-based countries due to falling oil prices. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, Morocco, and Kuwait are the other countries facing the economic effects due to COVID-19 pandemic. However, the government bodies in the region have recently uplifted the travel restrictions, which enabled transportation but with all safety measures and social distancing norms. Thus, to ensure compliance with social distancing norms and reduce contact within security personnel and passengers, public places such as airports, borders, and railway stations are adopting contactless or automatic security inspection systems. For instance, in October 2020, Vision-Box announced the integration of digital identification platform for Emirates airline in the Dubai International Airport to offer a contactless passenger traveling experience coupled with identification, safety, and security monitoring environment.
The overall MEA security inspection market size has been derived using both primary and secondary sources. To begin the research process, exhaustive secondary research has been conducted using internal and external sources to obtain qualitative and quantitative information related to the market. The process also serves the purpose of obtaining overview and forecast for the MEA security inspection market with respects to all the segments pertaining to the region. Also, multiple primary interviews have been conducted with industry participants and commentators to validate the data, as well as to gain more analytical insights into the topic. The participants who typically take part in such a process include industry experts such as VPs, business development managers, market intelligence managers, and national sales managers along with external consultants such as valuation experts, research analysts, and key opinion leaders specializing in the MEA security inspection market. Leidos; Nuctech Company Limited; OSI Systems, Inc.; Smiths Group plc; unival group GmbH are among a few players operating in the MEA security inspection market.