IoT is powering transformation for enterprises, consumers, and governments and is the next big thing in the world of Internet. IoT will disrupt companies, but companies are still clueless to how exactly they would invest. Still there are companies that are starting to have a clear-cut idea of where exactly to invest, and how, can reap the early mover advantage.
According to IHS, the continued growth of the IoT industry is going to be a transformative force across all organizations. By integrating all of our modern day devices with internet connectivity, the IoT market is on pace to grow to over $3 trillion annually by 2026.
Companies looking to generate revenue from the IoT will need to transform the information from smart, connected products into services by offering the entire product as a service, or using the product’s data stream to engage customers with additional services.
The most obvious IoT investments are sensors, processor chips, and wi-networks,besides supporting equipment such as routers and modems. Hardware firms such as Qualcomm offer IoT chips, and networking companies such as Aruba Network, Ruckus Wireless, and a host of others, offer IoT solutions. However, not all companies would need to, or even have the capability to set up custom IoT implementations. They would rather deploy ready-to-go IoT solutions available in the market.
A barometer of which IoT product or project is likely to succeed is the interest shown by investors to the device or project. For example, Google’s Nest Learning Thermostat is widely popular among investors, and backed by Google, is a safe bet for enterprises to control air conditioning and other devices and achieve optimal energy efficiency.
Major manufacturers such as Samsung are releasing new “smart” and IoT compatible models of their existing equipment and device ranges. IBMResearch’s Precision Agriculture is helping farmers use data to make precise decisions from planting, growing, harvesting, to transporting food. Devices from such established majors gain the advantage of an established market and client base.
Many enterprises investing in IoT make the mistake of focusing their energies on setting up the infrastructure. Success requires giving equal focus on the analytical tools that aggregate data from sensors, integrate it with information already available in the company database, subject the data to analytics, and present the results to the stakeholders, in the form of actionable information. Several organizations and vendors offer solutions to help companies analyze and make sense of the vast amount of data the sensors collect.
As IoT grows, more companies will need to rely on experts to make it through the digital transformation, for example Hitachi Consulting helps other companies apply IoT solutions to maximize their business value and lets them become innovators in the IoT space all on their own.
Here are some perspectives on how IoT can help increase revenue opportunities:
- Track inventories wisely to identify potential income from the available resources and eliminate those with high risk of business losses.
- Identify business assets and drive potential marketing campaigns to optimize earnings.
- Minimize business downtime using strategies that allow to gain insightful predictions and use this data to find the proper contingency solution to monitor, and address this problem as it occurs.
- Identify maintenance programs essential in responding to the probable of problematic issues in business operations in the future.
- Manage different revenue nodes or devices to monetize the business performance.
IoT is still an extremely fluid space, and investing in it requires an effort. Enterprises need to indulge in a lot of research matching the available solutions to their specific business processes and a solid model to turn that value into near-term profitability, and a long-term perspective on the importance of data, organizations can not only create products that connect with customers, but build a foundation to lead their market into decades of future growth.