Businesses that create products to reduce crime are onto a very good thing indeed, particularly if they provide a completely unique service - both the purchasing authorities as well as residents will back it.
One such item has been gaining favour across an increasing number of US cities and was recently featured in CNN Money.
The article, entitled 'A sonic silver bullet for fighting crime: Gunshot monitoring technology scores big with local police', takes a look at a new product that is helping to reduce gun crime wherever it goes.
Known as ShotSpotter, the product is a collection of microphones mounted on telephone poles that are set up to listen out for one thing and one thing only - gunfire.
The microphones can detect a gunshot from a mile or more away allowing the device to pin-point the location via a triangulation system. The service links this information to the local police department, who can attend the exact scene in much better time.
The programme is currently in 45 cities across the country and has been met with minimal opposition, and the statistics indicate why this is the case.
In San Francisco, where the system was installed in 2008, the crime rate has dropped by 50 per cent since the start of the year. The area's police department suggest that the predominant effect that the microphones have on criminals is deterrence.
Lieutenant Mikail Ali, who overlooks the monitoring of the two-mile area that the city has covered, told the news provider: "There's an understanding within the criminal element of the technology, and I think that's causing incidents to decrease."
The company charges $25,000 per mile covered and currently listens in to 125 square miles of US city space. It's not doing badly and things look to be improving.
Looking to the future, it is hoping to take its product abroad and has already targeted Brazil - a country notorious for its gun problems.
The US Army has also been trialling the product in Iraq, and is a contract that could be highly lucrative if it takes off.
The product has led to a number of arrests in a variety of its host cities.
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