Olympics Security Is No Game

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A rehearsal for the opening ceremony at the "Bird's Nest" stadium, where Honeywell has a $20 million contract. Saeed Khan/AFP/Getty Images

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And an IBM product called Smart Surveillance System, or S3, helps authorities keep track of images from some of the 300,000 video cameras watching for potential troublemakers on the streets of the capital, IDG News Service reported in December. IBM declined to comment.

Smaller companies are stepping in, too. Segway, the maker of two-wheeled, electric-powered scooters, has sold more than 100 of the $5,300 transporters for use at the Games. Many of these will be manned by police and other security-agency personnel. And ASK-TongFang, a French-Chinese tech outfit, is providing tickets with radio-­frequency-­identification chips in them. These allow authorities to maintain a central database of information on ticket holders and track their movements.

China's "Huge Opportunities"

Probably no foreign company is more involved in Olympics security than GE. Its gear is installed in 22 venues, and it has 150 technicians on hand in case of breakdowns during the Games. At the Beijing airport the company has supplied seven detection systems that sniff the air for particles indicating that a passerby might be carrying a bomb or drugs. And the newly built subway line No. 10, which skirts the Olympic Village, is using GE video-surveillance devices. All told, 168 buildings in the capital have GE security equipment, and the company recently won the entire security contract for the new headquarters of national broadcaster CCTV, built in part as a showcase for the Olympics. GE declines to say how much the deal is worth.

Business doesn't end when the Games wrap up, either. Contracts for the Olympics are crucial to break into security in China, a market that will likely grow 30% this year, to nearly $11 billion—just behind the U.S., according to the Security Industry Assn. GE will provide security equipment for the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai and for that year's Asian Games in the southern city of Guangzhou."These are mega-events with big infrastructure needs," says James D. Fisher, who oversees GE's Olympics-related business. Moreover, China has more than a dozen cities with populations topping 5 million, and "every one of these is building new subways, new airports, new stadiums, and new commercial buildings," says Fisher. "These are all huge opportunities."

Some experts warn that multinationals need to weigh such opportunities against the risks. China, after all, has a checkered human rights record. And the public security force, which is the buyer of most security equipment, is at the heart of efforts to clamp down on dissent—and could well end up using the nifty new gear to do just that. "All this top security technology is being employed for the Olympics," says Richard Chace, CEO of the Security Industry Assn. "The question is, what happens to it and how is it used after the Games?"

—With Ellen Gibson in New York. Roberts is BusinessWeek's Asia News Editor and China bureau chief.