What is the added value of Internet of Things?

As Internet of Things applications are evolving, a lot of attention has been put on devices, sensors, connectivity and data gathering. However, the technology behind the IoT and the data it generates is outpacing our ability to consume, analyze, and drive value with it. This must change, organizations need to focus on the necessary data streams and their possible business enablers first … before implementing any IoT solution.

Some key considerations to start with:

• What insights can add value to my business or to my clients’ business
• What extra services can/do we want to offer to our (potential) client-base if we could provide real-time insights

Implementing an IoT solution that delivers the required data & insights does not start from a technical point of view. It kicks-off with a business analysis conducted by someone who has a frim understanding of the business at hand. Adding value can only be achieved if you have sufficient business knowledge. Without knowing what you want to measure you will never be able to define the how.

Internet of Things analytics is a bit of a different animal from business as usual analytics or even Big Data analytics. Data gathering from Internet of Things applications can vary depending on the use case. The number of sensors and volumes of data can range wildly depending on the application but at the core of the Internet of Things is a tremendous amount of structured data (machine data) coming in at a high velocity.

“Processing data to provide actionable insights

is what it’s all about ...

it’s not the things that matter ... 

it’s processing the data.”

Advanced data management and analytic infrastructure will be key for an IoT solution. Companies that are building the data management and analytic component of their IoT applications on a traditional, monolithic relational database infrastructure will quickly find that their large scale analytic requirements will break their legacy architectures and the costs to maintain their architecture will skyrocket.

What will be the true impact of IoT?

Many have tried, but nobody can tell …

 

The IoT may significantly affect many aspects of the economy and society, although the full extent of its impacts remains uncertain. As always with new technologies, many observers predict that the growth of the IoT will bring positive benefits through enhanced integration, efficiency, and productivity across many sectors. Significant impacts may also be felt more broadly on economic growth, infrastructure and cities, and of course on individual consumers. However, both policy and technical challenges, including security and privacy issues, might impact the growth and impact of IoT’s innovation.

 

Let’s be clear, the IoT will contribute significantly to economic growth over the next decade, but the predictions vary substantially in magnitude and let’s be honest some business cannot be counted as growth but is merely a must have upgrade or shift towards a newer “technological platform” to enable business continuity.

 

With the IoT unlimited possibilities arise to enhance the quality of our lives, but we have to be cautious when it comes down to the figures … . The current global IoT market has been valued at about $2 trillion, with estimates of its predicted value over the next five to ten years varying from $4 trillion to $11 trillion. Such variability demonstrates the difficulty of making economic forecasts in the face of various uncertainties, including:

• Reports of security flaws that pop up every day. If people have a lack of trust in the IoT, it might never really take off.
• Data privacy, who owns all the data that will be generated by the millions of connected devices, who will pay to be allowed access to certain data, … .
• What will be the role of the government and the impact of the regulations it will impose.
• A lack of consensus among researchers about exactly what the IoT is and how it will develop. Ex: not all home automation devices can be considered as “IoT devices” although they pretend to be.

In a few years, and it’s already happening one step @ a time, the IoT will fundamentally transform the way people and things interact with each other in a real-time and ongoing loop of information. Companies will have to change the way they do business, the shift towards other competences, services & sales channels will be inevitable to stay alive and is the biggest challenge.

Internet of Things SWOT

Check-out my homemade #IoT #SWOT analysis

Do feel free to add or correct if you feel like ...

I will write the how's and why's on this in the coming days.

Minions character board

I just created this awesome #Minions #character board on #Pinterest - Share the news & other characters with me! pic.twitter.com/DzNLcSBty3

— Bart Keybergh (@BartKeybergh) November 10, 2015

Check it out https://www.pinterest.com/bartkeybergh/world-of-minions/

Internet of Things Leuven Meetup: DatePicking First Community Event ‏

Hello to all you IoT Groupies – We are hot!

I first wanted to check the response on this group … I must say that in the last months I've talked to a lot of people and I think we've got "a burning platform" in our local region. Which is fantastic because IoT comes with a huge load of opportunities.

So now that summer holidays are long gone and everybody is back in the daily routine it's time to really get up to speed with our Internet of Things community. I've got a few possible locations and 2 or 3 possible speakers, depending on the exact date and number of attendees. To facilitate the date picking I've created a doodle so please enter your availability asap.

List of possible topics: IoT in general, smartcity, smarthome, technical building blocks on IoT, business opportunities. Let me know if you have other topics you would like to see discussed or if you know somebody who can come and talk on any related aspect of IoT.

Join our community on http://www.meetup.com/Internet-of-Things-IoT-Leuven/

I'll be putting this message on twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and my blog. Don't forget to spread the word on all possible social media, hope to CU soon in large numbers!

Bart

http://about.me/bart.keybergh