SHARES in IndigoVision have jumped more than 15 per cent after the company said the immediate outlook was “more positive than it has been for some time”.

The software-led, end-to-end security provider said with sales growing in the first four months of the year, it had put into play a strategy to grow market share in the US “dramatically”.

In a trading update issued before the AIM-listed group’s annual meeting yesterday, which was the last led by outgoing chairman Hamish Grossart, IndigoVision said it expected both sales and profits to rise in 2017.

Speaking after the meeting, chief executive Marcus Kneen said: “Modest market share in America would be a higher volume than we sell globally, currently.

“Our major competitors will have 60 per cent [of sales] in the US, we have 20 per cent so the opportunity is there, the product is fit for purpose, we have existing reference sites and installation partners; we just had to professionalise our approach to sales... in the US.”

The company has invested in growing from two directors and six sales managers in the US, to three directors and nine sales managers.

In a highly commoditised environment that Mr Kneen called the “new reality”, IndigoVision, for the four months to April 2017, saw year-on-year growth of 27 per cent in software licences and ten per cent in camera volume.

In the first four months of 2017, revenue has grown in excess of ten per cent in Latin America, and in Europe, Middle East and Africa. Asia Pacific sales are in line with last year, while North American sales were described as “well below potential”.

But IndigoVision said the impact of the new US sales team would be seen in second half results.

The Edinburgh business, which has contracts with national and local governments, and the likes of oil and gas firms, airports and casinos, posted revenue of $46 million in 2016, a slight decline with the impact of falling prices – an issue that saw IndigoVision stop making its own cameras.

“We’ve worked out how to cope with the new reality, the reality of commoditised camera prices,” said Mr Kneen.

The company said that after declining throughout 2016, average camera prices have now stabilised. Pricing pressure on software, combined with lower priced software tiers launched by the company in November, has meant additional volumes have yielded modest growth in overall revenue.

Mr Kneen acknowledged that research and development spend had reduced, but put this down to a “moment in time”, and said there were plans to increase the number of engineers by 30 per cent.

“We’re rebuilding momentum having had the fall off, the new reality in the marketplace in 2014 and 2015,” he said. “The first thing we had to gain was sales momentum. The priority [now] is to differentiate the product.”

That differentiation comes courtesy of CyberVigilant, a patent-protected cyber security solution that monitors traffic between CCTV cameras and the networks that stream and upload footage to track any unusual behaviour. If a hacker tries to access the system, an alert is issued.

It was launched at the influential ISC West trade show in Las Vegas in April. Mr Kneen said the company had seen more visitors to its stand than in any other year.

“We’re finding that Cyber is hitting the button with a lot of people who don’t feel safe,” he said.

Over the past year a number of high-profile leaks and hacks have increased awareness of the vulnerabilities that businesses, and individuals, face, and Mr Kneen acknowledged that in the security business, this led to increased sales.

He said: “I’d prefer if that didn’t help our business, but it does.

“It is an uncertain world, and it is becoming more uncertain and therefore you’ve got to protect people in this new reality. And we’ve got a role to play there.”

At the meeting Mr Grossart said his replacement was likely to be announced in “a matter of weeks”.

Mr Grossart, who has been chairman for 20 years, was given a round of applause by shareholders. He announced he would retire from the board last month.