As STid celebrates 30 years of innovation, Vincent Dupart, CEO, looks ahead to the future of high-security access control – and unveils the next chapter with Architect 2.
As STid prepares to launch its new solutions, what are your main ambitions for this new chapter in the company’s development?
This year, STid is celebrating 30 years of innovation in high-security access control. Just over 10 years ago, we launched Architect with the ambition of reinventing the high-security access control reader.
This first generation became the world’s most awarded range of access control readers and established itself as a market benchmark.
But the world has changed dramatically over the past decade. Cyber-attacks have become faster, more sophisticated and sometimes hybrid. Some obsolete identification technologies can now be copied in seconds, while mobile technologies, protocols and user needs continue to evolve.
At the same time, regulations such as the Cyber Resilience Act and NIS2 are becoming increasingly stringent, requiring security to be demonstrable, auditable and sustainable over time.
Expectations have also changed: reducing environmental impact, making access more inclusive and protecting our customers’ investments over the long term. An access control reader installed today will remain in place for 10-15 years. During that time, threats, technologies and regulations will continue to evolve. Its capabilities can therefore no longer remain static.
Architect 2 was born out of this realisation. Our goal was not simply to upgrade an existing reader, but to design a future-ready security platform capable of adapting to the threats, technologies and use cases of the next fifteen years.
It was designed to become the most secure, inclusive, energy-efficient and future-ready reader on the market. Built-in modularity enables it to support emerging technologies and evolve over time without requiring existing infrastructures to be replaced.
Our ambition is clear: to redefine the access control standard once again. More than ever, we remain committed to our position as a high-value technology provider. Our hardware and services are designed to integrate seamlessly into the solutions offered by our manufacturing partners and to be deployed by integrators.
Which market challenges or customer needs guided the development of this new generation of products?
The first challenge was, and remains, long-term sustainability.
Our customers need to be able to invest in infrastructure today that can adapt for tomorrow. In an environment where threats, regulations and user needs are evolving at a rapid pace, a reader can no longer be a static device. It must be upgradable, expandable and auditable throughout its entire lifecycle.
The second challenge is end-to-end cybersecurity. Securing the credential or the reader alone is no longer enough. Every exchange between the credential, the reader and the access control system must be protected.
Finally, our customers expect solutions that are easier to integrate, deploy and maintain. Architect 2 was therefore designed as an open, scalable and interoperable hardware and technology platform.
It enables our manufacturing partners to enhance their solutions and help their customers transition toward future security standards without having to rethink their architecture or business model.
What does innovation mean to you? Is it about creating something new or solving an existing problem more effectively?
For me, innovation only has value if it addresses a real problem and genuinely improves the user experience. It is not simply about adding new technologies, but about rethinking a product as a whole to make it more effective, simpler, more accessible and more responsible.
That is precisely the approach we took with Architect 2. We set out to strengthen security while reducing the constraints traditionally associated with access control, including integration complexity, usability, accessibility and energy consumption.
Environmental performance is an integral part of innovation. Corporate social responsibility was not added to the product after it had been designed; it guided our choices from the very beginning. As a result, Architect 2 can consume up to 10 times less power than a standard reader.
The same approach led us to develop new identification methods that make access simpler and more inclusive. We worked with organisations representing people who are blind or visually impaired to understand their real-life experiences and the practical difficulties they face.
Innovation means combining a higher level of security with an experience that is simpler, more inclusive and more responsible. The best innovation strengthens security while reducing its impact and constraints for both users and the environment.
When you look at the future of the industry, what excites you most – and what keeps you awake at night?
What excites me most is the convergence of physical security, cybersecurity and digital identity. The reader is becoming an intelligent interface capable of recognising different technologies, adapting to new use cases and evolving over time.
This transformation is paving the way for access control that is more seamless, intuitive and inclusive. By reducing perceived constraints without compromising protection, it can help users embrace even the most demanding security policies.
What concerns me, however, is the gap between the speed at which threats are evolving and the pace at which infrastructures are being modernised. Many systems still rely on legacy technologies that are sometimes proprietary, difficult to update or inadequately protected.
Our responsibility is to make the transition toward future security standards gradual, accessible and economically viable for the entire ecosystem.
What is the main challenge the access control and identification industry will need to address in the coming years?
The main challenge will be to build lasting trust in an increasingly connected environment.
That trust requires end-to-end security – from the credential to the access control system, including the reader, communications, updates and associated services. Securing a single component can no longer compensate for vulnerabilities elsewhere in the chain.
Our industry must also accelerate the adoption of open, interoperable and future-ready technologies. This is essential if manufacturers, integrators and end users are to upgrade their infrastructures without having to replace them entirely.
Finally, the future access control standard cannot be defined by cybersecurity alone. It must also be energy-efficient, privacy-conscious and accessible to everyone.
The real challenge will be to bring security, openness, sustainability and inclusion together under a single standard of excellence.