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10 innovative applications of IOT

By on 10/10/2016   /   Articles, In-house content   /   1 Comment

Rubina S Das.

Gartner research suggests that there will be 6.4 billion connected devices in 2016, and that figure will hit 20.8 billion by 2020.

Friends, welcome to the Digital Universe! Which is growing 40% a year into the next decade, expanding to include not only the increasing number of people and enterprises doing everything online, but also all the “things” (smart devices) connected to the Internet, unleashing a new wave of opportunities for businesses and people around the world. It is doubling in size every two years, and by 2020 the digital universe (the data we create and copy annually) will reach 44 zettabytes, or 44 trillion gigabytes. They go on to depict that as, enough to fill a stack of 128GB iPad Air tablets 2/3 of the way to the moon and back (157,674 miles).

The Internet of Things (IoT) fed by sensors soon to number in the trillions, working with intelligent systems in the billions, and involving millions of applications, the IoT will drive new consumer and business behaviour that will demand increasingly intelligent industry solutions, which, in turn, will drive trillions of dollars in opportunity for IT vendors and even more for the companies that take advantage of the IoT.

So let’s check the top ten innovative applications of IoT with the potential for exponential growth in this Digital Universe.

  1. Smart Homes / Home Automation

More than 60,000 people currently search for the term “Smart Home” each month on Google. This shouldn’t come as a surprise as more companies are active in smart home than any other application in the field of IoT. The total amount of funding for Smart Home start-ups currently exceeds $2.5bn.

So what is the definition of a smart home? In simple words a smart home is the one in which the devices have the capability to communicate with each other as well as to their intangible environment. A smart home gives owner the capability to customize and control home environment for increased security and efficient energy management.

Consumer product manufacturers like Belkin, Philips, Amazon and Haier have already established themselves as prominent companies in this market. Here are some examples of internet of things for building your own smart homes.

             A. Nest Learning Thermostat

Nest Learning Thermostat is a revolutionary concept which gives you many benefits. Its breakthrough technology and internet of things based concepts make it a highly efficient electric appliance. Usually thermostats incur almost half of the energy bills. However, with Nest you can save up to 15% on cooling bills as well as 12% on heating bills on average.

             B. Philips Hue-Smart Home Lighting

What is the real potential of internet of things applications for designing smart homes is aptly projected by Philips Hue. The same hue bulb gives you 600 to 800 colour lumens which mean there is a light for every mood of yours. It is compatible with known smart home platforms like HomeKit for Apple iPhone and Amazon Echo.

             C. Amazon Echo

Take control of your home with your voice, this is the concept around which Amazon Echo is built. Designed to be a highly sensitive listener, Echo has 7 inbuilt microphones to hear you from across the room even among other noises. Get answers, hear news, play music, listen to audio books and integrate to other smart home devices like Philips Hue, Samsung SmartThings and WeMo. It is backed with 360º omni-directional audio.

 

  1. Wearables

Wearables are one of the hottest trends in IoT currently. Apple, Samsung, Jawbone and plenty of others all are surviving in a cut throat competition. Of all the IoT start-ups, wearables maker Jawbone is probably the one with the biggest funding to date. It stands at more than half a billion dollars!

Wearable IoT tech is a very large domain and consists of an array of devices. These devices broadly cover the fitness, health and entertainment requirements. The prerequisite from internet of things technology for wearable applications is to be highly energy efficient or ultra-low power and small sized. Here are some top examples of wearable IoT devices that fulfill these requirements.

             A. Jawbone UP2

This tracker band is an excellent IoT application example in healthcare as well as wearable. It comes with features like activity tracking, food logging and sleep patterns. Also it is offered in many styles and colours. It has features like Activity Tracking, Sleep Tracking and Smart Coach.

            B. Fitbit ChargeHR

Charge HR is a high performance IoT wearable which is provided with many smart features. It tracks your heart rate as well as activities sitting on your wrist. It provides you capability to automatically track heart rate, track workouts, monitor sleeping pattern, get call notifications, and synchronize data with your PC and hundreds of Smart Phones wireless and many more.

            C. Motorola Moto 360 Sport

It’s time to get your healthy space personalized even without your smart phone. Motorola Moto 360 Sport is designed with this fact in mind. It delivers all the important information that you need from your phone directly. Available in men’s and women’s collection you will hardly run out of choice with this. It supports both Android as well as iOS apps.

 

  1. Smart City

Smart surveillance, safer and automated transportation, smarter energy management systems and environmental monitoring all are examples of internet of things applications for smart cities. Its popularity is fuelled by the fact that many Smart City solutions promise to alleviate real pains of people living in cities these days. IoT solutions in the area of Smart City solve traffic congestion problems, reduce noise and pollution and help make cities safer.

            A. Bigbelly Smart Waste And Recycling System

Bigbelly smart waste and recycling system is a smart waste management system for smart cities. A completely modular system, Bigbelly gives historical as well as real-time and data collection capability via cloud-based service. It helps with smart trash picking, avoid overflows and generate notifications making waste management truly smart.

            B. CitySense-Smart Street Lighting

Based on a patented presence-detecting technology CitySense is a smart and wireless outdoor lighting control system. With features like adaptive lighting it helps in saving electricity by intuitively adjusting brightness of streets lights based on presence of automobiles and pedestrians. It is smart enough to filter interferences like animals and trees.

            C. Libelium-Metiora Smart Parking Sigfox Kit

Libelium has launch a new Smart Parking solution for Smart Cities that allows citizens to detect available parking spots. The new surface parking device -with LoRaWAN and Sigfox- features smaller size, higher accuracy and faster time of detection facilitating lower installation costs.

 

  1. Smart grids / Smart Metering

A future smart grid promises to use information about the behaviours of electricity suppliers and consumers in an automated fashion to improve the efficiency, reliability, and economics of electricity. Power grids of the future will not only be smart enough but also highly reliable. The basic idea behind the smart grids is to collect data in automated fashion and analyse the behaviour of electricity consumers and suppliers for improving efficiency as well as economics of electricity use.

           A. Smart Metering

Advanced metering will make energy management easier for everyone. Landis+Gyr are a wide range of energy management products. The smart metering solution offered by Landis+Gyr consumers to better understand their energy needs as well help them with load management as well. They have many multi-energy metering solutions to offer for reliable and efficient energy management.

           B. Smart Grid Management

Landis+Gyr’s grid management solutions are smart programs that provide capabilities to automate analyse as well as response to energy requirements in a smarter manner. They offer leading-edge tools that help both suppliers as well as consumers to reduce peak use problem as well increase energy use efficiency.

 

  1. Industrial internet / Industrial Control

The industrial internet is also one of the special Internet of Things applications. While many market researches such as Gartner or Cisco see the industrial internet as the IoT concept with the highest overall potential, its popularity currently doesn’t reach the masses like smart home or wearables do.

With help of internet of things infrastructure backed with advanced sensor networks, wireless connectivity, innovative hardware and machine-to-machine communication, conventional automation process of industries will transform completely.

           A. Smart Structures’ Embedded Data Collector

In the construction industry it is very important to determine the quality of concrete. The EDC or Embedded Data Collector from Smart Structure helps with this big time. The system works by embedding the sensors in the concrete during pouring and curing process. This way the sensors become permanent part of the structure. They provide vital information about the strength and quality of concrete directly to the Smart Structures Work Station.

           B. Libelium Waspmote Sensor Nodes

Libelium is known to prove internet of things application solution for industries. With the Waspmote Sensor Nodes accompanies with new API libraries and industrial protocol modules released by the company help easy integration of industrial devices with the cloud for data communication. Some of the supported industrial protocols are CAN Bus, RS-232 and RS-485. Application of these nodes range from automation to military to manufacturing sector.

 

  1. Connected car

Owing to the fact that the development cycles in the automotive industry typically take 2-4 years, we haven’t seen much buzz around the connected car yet. But it seems we are getting there. Most large auto makers as well as some brave start-ups are working on connected car solutions.  And if the BMWs and Fords of this world don’t present the next generation internet connected car soon, other well-known giants will: Google, Microsoft, and Apple have all announced connected car platforms.

           A. Latest Locomotive From GE

The latest GE Evolution Series Tier 4 Locomotive is loaded with 250 sensors to measure staggering 150,000 data points in a minute. This data combined with other incoming streams of data from informational and operating systems helps in anticipating events and help take driving decisions in real time.

           B. Caterpillar’s Newest Equipment

Caterpillar is helping its dealers to succeed with help of IoT for industrial analytics. Company is harnessing data it collects from its industrial locomotives like engines, machines and tools and shares the analysed data insights with its customers. It helps them to anticipate problems, manage fleets and schedule maintenance proactively.

 

  1. Healthcare

The concept of a connected health care system and smart medical devices bears enormous potential, not just for companies also for the well-being of people in general. Yet, connected Health has not reached the masses yet. Prominent use cases and large-scale start up successes are still to be seen. Some IoT examples in this domain are:

            A. Future Path Medical’s UroSense

UroSense is a smart fluid management solution offered by the Future Path Medical. It automatically measures the CBT or Core Body Temperature and urine output of patients on catheterization. Smart monitoring of these vital signs helps in avoiding infections as well as help in starting early care of medical conditions like diabetes, prostate cancer, heart failure and sepsis. UroSense can provide report data directly to nursing stations anywhere wirelessly.

             B. Philips’ Medication Dispensing Service

Philips is one of those tech giants which are making full use of internet of things opportunities available for business. Medication Dispensing Service is one of the most successful IoT healthcare applications from Philips.  Focused around elderly patients who find it difficult to maintain their medication dosage on their own, MDS dispenses pre-filled cups as per the scheduled dosage. It notifies automatically when it’s time to take medicine, refill, and malfunctioning or misses dosage.

 

  1. Retail

The potential of IoT in the retail sector is enormous. Imagine the scenario when your home appliances will be able to notify you about shortage of supplies or even order them all on their own. This proximity-based advertising model of smart retailing has started to become a reality. We already have internet of things application examples as part of smart supply chains. Applications for tracking goods, real time information exchange about inventory among suppliers and retailers and automated delivery all existing but with a limited reach.

                A. Smart Retail Solution

TCIs’ Smart Retail Solution is based on innovative software, reliable wireless devices and ePOS Stations. Known as one of the best smart retailing solutions in the market it is powered by the Yourcegid Retail management software. Automating complex interactions of multiple sources, collecting important consumer data, creating alerts for errors on time and monitoring staff activities, Smart Retail Solution avoids costly mistakes and maximizes capital of resources.

 

  1. Agriculture

Agriculture sector needs very institutive as well as highly scalable technology solutions. Internet of things applications can deliver exactly the same to farmers. Smart farming is an often overlooked business-case for the internet of Things because it does not really fit into the well-known categories such as health, mobility, or industrial. However, due to the remoteness of farming operations and the large number of livestock that could be monitored the Internet of Things could revolutionize the way farmers work. But this idea has not yet reached large-scale attention.

               A. The OpenIoT Phenonet Project

The Phenonet Project is designed to help farmers monitor crucial vitals like humidity, air temperature and soil quality using remote sensors. This project helps farmers to improve the yield, plan irrigation as well as make harvest forecasts. It is also helpful for biologists to study the effect of genome and microclimate on crop production.

             B. CleanGrow’s Carbon Nanotube Probe

Based in Ireland the CleanGrow’s project helps with monitoring the crop nutrients making use of a carbon nanotube-based sensor system. This information helps farmers to alter maturity rate or colour of the crop production. As opposed to analog devices used conventionally the CleanGrow device uses a nanotube sensor that detects quantity and presence of specific ion in the production.

 

  1. Security & Emergencies

Reliability and security should never be an afterthought as they are the chief requirements to build a safe and sound country for the people. Be it a natural disaster like flood, tsunami, earthquake or an environmental change or precaution to control Radiation Levels, Ultraviolet solar radiation, innovative IoT applications could be a boon for the people. If there would have been a motto for Security and Emergency innovative IoT applications it would have been Helping save lives.

               A. Smart Water: wireless sensor networks to detect floods and respond

Wireless Sensor Networks by Libelium are a cost-effective and scalable alternative for detecting early flood signs, forecasting floods, and monitoring flooding areas. Motes can be spreaded along the course of a river to measure increased water levels and generate alerts wirelessly by SMS or Internet database posting.

               B. Wireless Sensor Networks to Control Radiation Levels

An autonomous battery powered Geiger Counter which can read the radiation levels automatically and send the information in real time using wireless technologies like ZigBee and GPRS. The design of the sensor board is open hardware and the source code is released under GPL.

 

The IoT applications discussed above is just a glimpse trying to encapsulate the opportunities in the digital universe. A lot can be done with IoT application, but it will take determination and skilled workforce to find and put to use. It will need to be protected, analysed, and acted upon.

There is an abundance of technical solutions, and successful early adopters. But organizations must adapt – and adapt fast, given that the digital universe more than doubles every two years. This era involves the computerization, adding software and intelligence, to things – things as varied as cars and toys, airplanes and dishwashers, turbines and dog collars.

So if you think that the internet has changed your life, think again. The IoT application is about to change it all over again!

 

To stay on top with any trending information in IoT, follow us. Or even better, send us your feedback or ideas!

 

 

 

 

Reference Links:

https://iot-analytics.com/10-internet-of-things-applications/

 

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IoT Product Strategy | Collaborative development

By on 11/13/2015   /   In-house content   /   Leave a comment
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The last 2 years have seen quite a lot of Internet of Things product launches. Most of these have broken new ground and provided unheard of capabilities to the man-on-the-street. We have seen home defenses go up to unseen heights through the use of Home monitoring systems. These systems have the capability to remotely control doors, cameras and even automate notifying police based on internal intelligence. New baby monitoring products that have provided parents with capability to minutely oversee every aspect of the baby, so much so as to satisfy even the most neurotic ones among us have come through.

This first truly mass wave of products has given the mass customer the capability to monitor and control various aspects of their lives in amazing ways. Think back just 5 years – did you think we could have a smart-health-watch which could automatically call 911 if it felt the user’s heart rate was reaching dangerous levels? How about the now relatively commonplace capability of “smart sprinklers” to monitor weather patterns and automatically optimize their operation?

Internet of Things Products today

Unfortunately, while this has been a boon for the mass customer, this linear strategy has not led to strong returns for the manufacturer. Competitors have caught up quickly with these products and have led to a strong, sudden and fast drop in rates – leading to a vicious cycle of falling revenue for the first innovators, leading to lower investment in next gen R&D, resulting in lower quality products.

IoT Products Today

IoT Products Today

The problem is quite widespread. Knockoffs of popular products have always existed, but given today’s customers’ cost-centricity coupled with easier availability of these products thought eCommerce, problems have magnified.

Take a look at the link below:

http://goo.gl/pYZ9Fp

Can you identify which is the “better” more versatile product? I for one couldn’t, primarily owing to how close all products resemble in their feature sets. Sadly, this means that the customer will choose based mostly on cost, not capability – leading to our original vicious circle.

So are we doomed?

Not even remotely. However the second wave will have to embrace the collaborative nature of the internet of things model better than they have right now.

Let me illustrate using a current product capabilities and scenario versus one of tomorrow.

Current product capabilities of a major fitness tracker:

  1. Pedometer
  2. Heart Rate Monitor
  3. Calories Burnt Counter
  4. Report Dashboard

This devices uses the data generated/captured by its sensors to generate the cloud based report, which does a comparison of similar people in the demographic and provides a snazzy report.

However, most aspects of this are easily replicated. Lets now imagine a version 2.0 of this device with the following features:

  1. Pedometer v 2.0
  2. Heart Rate Monitor v 2.0
  3. Calories Burnt Counter v 2.0
  4. Automatic data transfer to compatible La-Z-Boy massager – which massages based on the amount of steps taken and calories burnt during the day optimized by the heart patterns.
  5. Reports Dashboard v 2.0

In addition to the general improvements in pedometer, monitor and counter, the key change here has been an interface development with the massager/recliner. Not only is it tremendous value to the consumer, but it is also very much something internet of things devices must be inherently capable of. These devices survive by generating, consuming and taking action upon data – sharing it is a simple extension that unlocks strong customer value.

However, it is also dependent upon the development of an interface which is next to impossible to copy. Your device interfacing with a second device requires both technological and more critically business involvement. These capabilities take time to develop and successful handshakes are determined by long term road maps and associated considerations. While a competitor can replicate features delivered by one device, it is a far longer shot to copy features delivered by the synergies between two devices.

The choice in front of anyone looking to make a quick buck by creating a knockoff becomes one of the two:

  • Create a product delivering the base features of the fitness tracker.
    • This choice means the product will lack all the capabilities delivered by the synergy between the two products. Essentially, any product delivered will be unable to compete with our innovator based on USP alone, and therefore the manufacturer has every right to charge a premium.
  • Create both products and develop a working interface
    • This choice requires substantial time and expenses to realize. Essentially, if the copycat is driven enough to develop and launch these, he would have wasted substantial time and energy, ultimately giving the innovator enough time to come up with his next version. In addition, no copycat can possibly deliver these “cheap”, and therefore there is no cost advantage to be had.

Conclusion

Partnerships have long been exploited as a tool within the corporate strategy toolkit to gain a capability and feature set advantage over the competition. Even when we look at the world around, most companies in different industries are operating in this model. Google, through its software Android has a partner in HTC, Samsung, LG and other hardware makers. Eat24 has partnered with Yelp.  Apply Pay with MasterCard. Even old world industries like Retailers and Fashion houses have had their share of exceptional partnerships including Christian Dior with Colette.

The IoT industry has inherent advantages owing to its data-in-the-cloud model. It is a simple step to share this data with strategically selected partners.

Question is, will the industry players go the extra mile and deliver something revolutionary, or are we destined to forgettable products?

About the Author

Abhinav Arora has spent the last decade managing digital product based solutions for some of the largest Fortune 500 firms across North America, Europe and Asia. He has earned his Masters in Business Administration, Bachelors in Technology and is Pragmatic Marketing – Certified Product Manager. Additional certifications include Certified SCRUM Product Owner and Certified Supply Chain Professional. His passion for music is only exceeded by his love for building market-centric products through measuring, evaluating and flowing the voice of the customer into products. He can be reached at abhinav_arora@outlook.com

Abhinav

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A Product Managers Perspective: How does IoT benefit your product?

By on 08/17/2015   /   In-house content   /   5 Comments
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Foreward:

This is intended to be the first in a series of articles looking at the Internet of Things from a Product manager’s perspective. This series will provide analytical tools on  what the IoT protocol can bring to your product, How to implement it and How to extract “maximum” value as well as good vs bad practices.

A lot of Ink has been spilled on how the IoT will define the next generation of new products. As happens with any new technology, or in this case protocol, much of this ink has promulgated the tactical “cool” benefits at the expense of the strategic.

This has resulted in promoting a tactical view of how IoT can increase the benefits delivered to your customers. The author intends to tackle this bull by the horns and start with relooking at the fundamental question in this article:

How does the Internet of Things protocol improve your device, product managers?

To answer this question, lets take a gander into how devices usually improve.

A (reasonably accurate) history lesson

Historically, devices improve incrementally by increase the depth of their capabilities and/or the breadth of their capabilities. Depth of Capability refers to the increase in the quality of any a feature of a product (whatever the metric for quality may be) with every next iteration of a product. Breadth of capability on the other hand represents an increase in features and capabilities with subsequent iterations of a device.

Lets take an example illustrating both depth and breadth.

When the need for writing instruments first reared its head, man was in his infancy looking to  share the images he saw in his head. He probably observed the black soot that gathered under the ever present fire in the cave and used a stone to draw something creating the first crude writing implement/pen.

However, the uneven quantity of the tip of the rock and the subsequent unevenness in writing as well as lack of “fine” point when it came to drawings led to the first iteration.

This first iteration, the feather pen and liquefied ink in a bottle improved the quality of writing but was still easily breakable, and the writer had to lug ink around.

As perhaps a response to these new needs of making the device more unbreakable, and to save writers from lugging ink around, the width of features offered in a writing implement was increased and we got our fountain pen.

This nifty little device was made of metal (and hence offered greater sustainability) and stored ink within its body (hence offered mobility).

Eventually, new needs were identified stemming from fountain pens running out of ink were identified and we got our Gel and ball pens.

Ultimately, we humans share a forever-feedback-looping symbiotic relationship with our devices. Our devices evolve to meet our ever evolving needs. Our needs evolve as a result of changes in devices.

However, there have historically been limits to this type of evolution. The most often seen limits are physical engineering limits.

Despite being launched in the ‘80s laptops were not popular because of the sheer heaviness. The evolution of desktop computers was limited by sheer Engineering challenges. Alternatively, look at the early cell phones. Owing to their sheer heaviness, they were not pupluar during their early days. Infact their weight defeated their stated purpose of mobility and therefore required multiple generational improvements to the technology (and hard work by the folks at Palm, Nokia and Iridium) to become popular.

Evolution of devices is also limited by the logical limits. These limits refer to capabilities that have no alignment to the existing use cases of a device. A simple example is a toaster-bathtub or a razor-cellphone (Sorry, Rong Zun 758). Other examples include LG’s LCD TV Refrigerator (with DVD Player connectors). The Logical Limit problem is exemplified by the disparity in the two use cases which have been brought together.

Pragmatic Limits occupy a space between the Physical limits and Logical limits. While additional capabilities can be added to an existing device without make it physically unwieldy, it only makes logical sense some of the time. To illustrate, let’s assume that Mrs. Coffee Inc. is deliberating creating their next coffee maker, this time with a toaster, where the user can make both coffee and toast by using a time based switch. In essence, the user can set a time (6:30 AM for instance) for the device to make both coffee and toast.

There are obvious pragmatic limits to such a device. The two use cases, Make Toast and Make Coffee are aligned in the morning, but later during the day, they make no sense together. Is the improvement delivered to the lives of the end users enough?

So what does this have to do with IoT?

IoT and M2M provide us with an actionable protocol to the usual methodology of “just-keep-adding-more”. Through enabling two machines to intercommunicate and coordinate, the need to physically meld two products together goes away.

Let’s take a hypothetical case.

Let’s say that you are a product manager for a DVD/Blu-Ray player. For your next iteration, you want to deliver a wow feature, and are considering the following set of features:

  1. Inbuilt Screen to display a movie on the go
  2. Inbuilt speakers
  3. A built in Pop-corn maker

The limits to iterating your product are obvious. The first is largely a pragmatic limit. Even though it makes sense some of the time, is the value delivered to the customer enough to deliver a physical screen?

With inbuilt speakers, the limit is logical. Is it logical to provide an extra set of speakers (and charging the extra cost to the customer) when he perhaps has a perfectly serviceable set of speakers in the TV, or better yet, in his entertainment system?

A built in Popcorn Unit presents multiple challenges including physical, logical and pragmatic. Is it physically possibly to segregate the oily, buttery popcorn unit from the easily damaged internals of an electronic device? Are the two use cases logically consistent all the time?

The M2M and Internet of Things protocol provides us with a revolutionary toolset to overcome these limits and actualize the certainly valid ideas behind the limits.

It does this through convering all devices into one single logical device. Through coordinating when it is “appropriate”, devices intelligently overcome the pragmatic limits. Hence, the blu-ray player will request the microwave to make popcorns when Predator is at to 5 minute mark. Alternatively, the blu-ray will communicate with your phone or tablet, or even the built in screen of your car to stream the movie. It will also communicate with your audiophile grade speaker set to play the sound hence eliminating the need for physical “merging” of two devices.

By giving us a way to overcome these limits, IoT and M2M have the capability to make our devices the must have for the holiday season.

 Postscript: The next in this series will cover the “right” questions to ask when implementing IoT in your devices.

 BIO

Product Manager, Digital Technologies. Abhinav has spent the last decade with some of the biggest Fortune 500 retail and Consumer Goods firms in the NA and EU markets. His love affair with Social Analytics started during the dark ages of Social Media with Friendster, when he built the very first metrics for a large Consumer Goods major. For the last few years, one of his focus areas has been social and voice of customer analytics adoption into New Product Development processes. He is an MBA (AIM, Manila), B.Tech., Certified Product Manager, Certified SCRUM Product Owner and CSCP.

 Photograph

Abhinav

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A Tale of Smart Cities – Internet of Things

By on 07/02/2015   /   In-house content  
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A Tale of Smart Cities – Internet of Things
October 28, 2030
6:45 am

The city of Technopolis is asleep.

Bob’s alarm clock starts ringing, its volume steadily rising. Even after an entire minute of relentless buzzing, Bob hasn’t budged. The clock then sends out signals to the thermostat, the drapes and the overhead lights. The room suddenly becomes chilly, the drapes open up and the lights shine bright.

Bob groans, “Shut up, you stupid thing”

The alarm is still blaring.

Shivering and agitated, Bob turns off the alarm clock. The noise stops, but it’s only after Bob gets out of bed and steps  onto the travellator, that everything else goes back to normal.

There’s a panel on the wall where Bob chooses his destination as ‘Bathroom 1’. Just before he steps into the bathroom, the lights in his bedroom go off and the lights in the bathroom go on. Every small thing contributes to energy saving.

He brushes, flosses and quickly checks his dental health rating. 8/10. Nice.

As is his habit, he steps on to the body analyzer. His heart rate is a little high, so soothing music starts playing in the bathroom. Due to his high BMI, the scale starts suggesting exercise and dietary changes. As usual, Bob cuts it off midway with a gesture. He’s turned off the ‘Report to Doctor’ feature permanently. Who cares about getting fat?
Now that the scale has measured his body temperature, Bob steps into the shower and taps a few buttons. A few minutes later, he’s soaped, shampooed and dried off. An efficient showering mechanism to reduce time and conserve water. Not to forget, the water is at exactly the right temperature. Brilliant, isn’t it?

He walks over to his wardrobe. It dispenses clothes according to the weather.

All dressed up, Bob goes to his kitchen. He gets his coffee from the machine and eats his toast in silence. He’s been living in Technopolis for so long that his previous lifestyle seems impossible now. Just last week, his toaster had detected a problem and sent a diagnostic report to the service center. Bob had received a message on his smartphone asking if he was willing to spend 20$ to fix the toaster. All he did was tap on ‘Yes’ and the payment was made, the toaster was fixed and Bob continued getting his toast every morning.

Cutting through his thoughts, an alarm starts ringing again. Time to go to work.

7:45 am

Hurriedly, he steps out of the house and activates the burglar alarm system. The thermostat, the lights and all other smart devices shut off. Quickly he gets into the backseat of his car, selects his destination and lies down. Bob’s always hated driving. Self-driving cars and traffic flow optimization are a boon. While wondering about why his clock woke him up early, Bob dozes off. He is oblivious to a different and longer route- a route that takes 15 minutes extra- taken by his car due to a faulty bridge on his usual route. Suddenly makes sense, doesn’t it? Anticipatory computing making life easy.

8:30 am

Bob reaches his office building and steps out of the car. His watch tells him the air quality is great. Reduced greenhouse gas emissions, low vehicular pollution and proper waste management for households and industries has resulted in a healthy environment. But due to advanced healthcare and increased life expectancy, the problem of overpopulation remained unsolved.

Bob enters the office building and notices everyone around him is wearing cotton shirts and shorts. “Darned global warming”, he mutters under his breath.

Quickly scanning his fingerprints, he takes the elevator up to his office and gets to work. Bob’s a builder. He and fellow architects spend the entire day working on their newest project- a 300 storied building. It’s in the final stages of completion. Using the HoloLens, the architects explain to him the exact structure of the building and the placement of all the sensors in the infrastructure integrity monitoring system. Every building is made keeping in mind that energy saving and water conservation are crucial.

7 pm

Bob’s ready to leave from work when his phone pings. It reminds him that his wife Betty is coming back in town tonight. Panicking for a moment, he checks his text messages. His phone has already sent Betty a sweet and loving message. Phew. Romance automated.

He goes to the airport to pick her up. She’s already waiting. The trakdot has made tracking luggage so easy. They go out for dinner and then head home.

10 pm

The house has pre-cooled to the right temperature.

Betty goes to bed and Bob plays on his Oculus Rift. Meanwhile, Bob’s car goes to the maintenance center for its monthly servicing.

11 pm

Oculus stops working when it senses that Bob’s eyes are getting strained. Quickly putting his phone on charge, Bob sleeps off.

That, folks, is just another day in the life of a smart city dweller.

Would you want to live like this? Which other IoT gadgets would you want to use? Comment below to let me know!

Note: This is a purely fictional (and perhaps a little far-fetched) story set in the future. The hyperlinks are only to show that similar devices exist in today’s world.

A Tale of Smart Cities – Internet of Things

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Internet of Things: A Business Case

By on 07/01/2015   /   In-house content   /   13 Comments
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The Internet of things has an amazing potential to transform every industry, both locally and globally. Being the CEO or CFO of a business, you must have asked yourself about the prospect of investing in the internet of things at one point or another. Today, I hope you get your questions answered. Being responsible for smooth functioning of an organisation, you must take every decision objectively based on various factors like cost reduction, increase in efficiency, feasibility and return on investment.

After spending countless hours perusing a number of articles and case studies on IoT and thinking about IoT investment pitches, I have compiled a comprehensive list that tells you the need to move to a connected ecosystem. Whether you are a small business owner or the owner of a multi-billion dollar brand, I am positive that you will be able to find something in here that will make you think about an investment in IoT.

Small Businesses
Small Businesses typically range from 15 to 50 employees. Now the big question: Why would a small and medium size business owner need connected solutions?
Take for example a store that sells a variety of clothes. The business relies heavily on supply and demand. If for some reason, the sales of a product ‘A’ fall and that of product ‘B’ increase, the manager has to inform the supplier to maintain the inventory accordingly. The manual solution to this situation will unnecessarily draw in time resources and need a lot of paper work and never-ending phone calls at both ends. How about getting rid of all this hassle for once and for all? Imagine if the sensor placed on the sales register was able to deliver real-time updates to the supplier’s computer, the demands would be adjusted automatically. The supplier will come to know that he has to deliver 30 units of product ‘A’ and 60 units of product ‘B’ in the coming week. This automation eliminates the repeated phone calls to the supplier and reduces the risk of misinformation due to human error.

Heavy industries
Being the CEO or CFO of, say, a heavy industry comprising thousands of employees, you have to factor in several things like feasibility, cost-benefit ratio, return on investment, shareholder sentiment, employee orientation and more before planning to invest in IoT.
In such an industry, IoT can fuel growth by reducing complexity and making daily tasks automated. For example, if you are the CEO of a power company, you could make use of a smart grid to manage the supply. The use of a smart grid can enable easy bi-directional flow of electricity. You could tap into the electricity generated by a solar cell when in need. The use of self-healing networks will reduce pressure on electricians as you can roll-out sophisticated updates to remove a fault. Lastly, when the meters are online, demand management can be done in a more subtle way. Currently, if a client ‘A’ needs more power, you have to fire up the reserve generators to meet the requirement. There is a considerable time lag in this case.  But, if the meters of all your clients are online, you could flash a message on their television sets asking them to reduce consumption for a while or you could control it at your end and meet the requirement of client ‘A’ with no time lag.

Take the example of a car manufacturing company. Car makers like Tesla are proposing to make smart cars which will be made up of connected parts. Such connected parts would be easy to maintain and repair. If the air pressure in one tire is critically low, the driver gets an alert as it is connected before it bursts and leads to an accident. One major criteria in this business is the time spent by the car in the garage for repairs. If the car is made up of connected parts, a majority of its functions will be governed by software rather than hardware. So, for certain ‘repairs’, you could just send a software update to the car over the air and voila! This saves your cost of manual labor and retains customers better.
A certain car maker was able to achieve high standards of security while keeping costs at bay in its attempt to deliver connected devices. The connected car now costs 3-4 times less than that of ICEs to make.​

Another example can be the manufacturing industry where a lot still depends on manual labor. If the machines on the shop floor are not connected, it is difficult to contain losses due to failure or non-performance of a single machine. Before you come to know that a certain machine has malfunctioned, it is too late. On the shop floor, every second counts! Imagine a scenario where machines are connected to each other using sensors. Suppose a machine in middle malfunctions, it can relay the message to the machines immediately after it to stop or slow down work until it is back online. This saves precious money and reduces the risk of sub-standard products. Moreover, maintenance of connected machines is simpler than that or offline ones.
A reputed manufacturing firm was able to achieve over 5% efficiency improvements saving over $200,000 per year by adopting Internet of Things approach.

Infrastructure
Infrastructure industry stands to benefit a lot from the internet of things. Think of a scenario where the roads are connected to traffic signals and cars. The sensors attached on the roads will be able to relay information to the cars that run on it, thus providing the driver with real-time updates of possible speed-breakers or potholes on the road. Drivers can also be alerted about possible accidents or sudden halts on the freeway that will reduce accidents and save costs (maybe save lives!). If roads are able to identify the number of cars on the road, they would be able to relay it to the traffic signals. Hence, traffic signal duration can be monitored dynamically rather than in a static fashion.
A similar ideology can be applied to structures like offshore oil drilling platforms where certain loose parts can cause the structure to dismantle and result in casualties. If the same structure was constructed using connected parts, the parts that became loose could communicate with the manufacturer or the operator relaying a distress signal for the same. A recent study assumed certain savings and penetration level for the Internet of Things to estimate around $500 billion in cost savings!

Apart from the above mentioned businesses, I think the government of a country has a role to play here too. The government will be able to lower production costs, increase citizen safety and maintain systematic logs for the same if the businesses go the IoT way. The government can make provisions to provide for certain incentives for businesses adopting the connected approach in their daily running.

In conclusion, I would like to say that investing in the Internet of Things is a safe bet. Like every other new avenue, internet of things also has a heavy investment cost associated with it. But, the benefits from the same can be realized in the long term. To give you further incentive, a recent study predicted that almost 82% of companies will have IoT applications implemented in some way or the other by 2017! (Source  )

So, this can be your opportunity to be a pioneer rather than becoming a follower!

I think I have been able to cover several scenarios to make you think about moving your business to a connected paradigm. If I have missed out any business or any aspect, or if you have any feedback/suggestions, please leave me a comment below.

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SWOT Analysis of the Internet of Things

By on 07/01/2015   /   In-house content   /   11 Comments
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Analyzing the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities & Threats of the Internet of Things

The next big thing in the technology era, the Internet of Things has arrived and how! It brings along an array of connected devices that promise to make our lives easier and better.

It is a brand new wave of technology that has been touted as an epoch-making change by many. No wonder some of us are enthusiastic while some of us are a little anxious when it comes to the prospect of investing in IoT. So, to make decisions simple for both, the excited and the apprehensive lot, here is a comprehensive and unbiased SWOT analysis of the Internet of Things.

SWOT

SWOT Analysis of IoT

Strengths

  • The Internet of Things can be modelled to reduce costs: A very basic example of connected devices is their use at a factory floor where the production units are connected to the delivery and sales units. If a particular product of a brand is not faring well in the market, the sales counter machine can alert the production units to decrease or abruptly halt the production if need be. This way, devices which are connected can communicate to reduce costs significantly.
  • Environment Friendly: Connected devices can be modelled to bring down carbon emissions and hence help protect the environment. Smart cars, smart lights and smart homes limit energy usage and consequently, reduce emissions. A recent report by the Carbon War Room predicts that the Internet of Things can alleviate emissions by 19%. IoT and the M2M industry can increase its value to $1 trillion in the next few years.(Source )
  • Innovation: Innovation has successfully steered the technology industry towards the present pinnacle. The era of connecting devices to realize a smart ecosystem enables untold possibilities (read opportunities!). Situations like these sprout innovation and paradigm-shifting ideas. IoT is still in stages of infancy, but it is safe to say that great things can be expected from it in the near future.
  • Public Interest and Hype: In 2012, IoT debuted on the Garner Hype Cycle. In 2014, it overtook Big. This was the result of all the buzz generated by IoT and the attention it seized from consumers and vendors alike. Giants like Apple, Microsoft and Google are already in the race to make intelligent devices available to consumers. This ever increasing media hype and recurring headlines about IoT is just what the doctor ordered! IoT is being welcomed heartily and its acceptance in the future is bound to rise.
  • Ease of Use: Let’s not deny that all of us want to be glorified couch potatoes and control the devices around us with a single commence from a single place. The Internet of Things will be able to connect devices with each other enabling them to communicate. This reduces our work and improves the overall standard of living. So, we can hope to say goodbye to multiple remotes and switches soon.

Weaknesses

  • Security: The most talked about drawback of connecting devices is their security and how it can be compromised by a small group of hackers. Recent activities of hackers trying to gain control over smart fridges is not doing any good to the reputation of IoT. However, there are attempts being made to revitalise security of such devices and to establish a common standard for the same.
  • Data Challenges: Every year, we produce data in exobytes. This data needs to be stored and analyzed for obtaining information about certain parameters. When all devices are connected, the amount of data collected will increase manyfold. Collection, analysis and storage of all that data is an arduous task and we need better infrastructure to manage the avalanche of data headed our way.
  • Massive Investments: Companies wishing to become early movers in the IoT market have to invest a lot of money to make connected devices. Apart from the production costs, there is a huge cost attached to the Research and Development of the products as well. This high cost might intimidate new market entrants. Companies need to stay poised to reap the benefits of such investments over time.
  • No Road Map: IoT is still in an infant stage. There is no clear road map, implying that there is no definite direction in which the development is moving. In such a scenario, the technology moves forward with innovation as and when it happens. As potential customers, we might find 10 variants for 1 gadget or maybe none for another. This sort of need-driven development will continue until the dust settles and certain standards are established for development of the internet of things.

Opportunities

  • Healthcare Applications: Paradigm-shifting to the field of personal healthcare is the agenda that is leading the revolution of connected devices. There are several opportunities for developers to innovate and make solutions to make our lives easier. Recent development of the Health Kit and Research Kit by Apple is just a step forward in the direction of improving healthcare. With so many ideas perking up every now and then and the state of current technology, anything is possible. As potential customers, this is a win-win situation for us.
  • Wearables: Smart watch, smart glass and smart clothes, all of them carry the ‘smart’ tag with them. Today, watches are able to record our daily activity, our workout routine and much more. Smart glasses are coming up to make everything around us interactive or into holograms. All this is leading us towards a time where everything we wear and hold can think for its own.
  • Infrastructure Management: The infrastructure management sector is another field that can make the most of IoT. Wearable devices like Google Glass and smart watches have already been deployed by off-shore drilling companies and construction companies. Microsoft’s Holo Lens promises to play a crucial role in the field of infrastructure.
  • Making computers more ubiquitous: Moore’s Law states that the size of computing microprocessors goes down by half every 18 months. This just goes to prove that developers are aiming to integrate computers in our lives in a very fine, intricate way such that we don’t feel them as separate entities. The recent flood of smart wearables aims to realize the dream to make computing completely ubiquitous among us.
  • Exciting investment opportunities: IoT brings with it an array of potential investment opportunities. I remember reading a piece by Dave Kelly that talked about how people who realized the potential of the smartphone and got on the smartphone bandwagon before the iPhone came out are now smiling their way to the bank. IoT has a huge upside potential for people looking to invest in chip making companies, solution making companies and more. It’s all uphill from here.

Threats

  • Vulnerability to hackers: When we think about hackers, we imagine really intelligent individuals working tirelessly on their Alienwares to bring down a website. Now, with connected devices in the picture, these hackers will be able to control your smart bulbs, garage, watches and even clothes! This open invitation to hackers to try to control every device around is a serious threat for IoT and it stands in the way of users shifting to connected devices.
  • Not Meeting People’s Expectations: A classic example to bring home this point can be the console game, Watchdogs. The game was previewed at a conference when it was in its early stages of development. People pinned hopes high expecting an open-world hacking game. But, what was delivered did not live up to the expectations, making it an average product after all. IoT here has reached the peak of it hype. People have realistic and over-the-top hopes from IoT. These exaggerated expectations are a threat to IoT if the products fail to live up to the user expectations.
  • Lack of demand due to high cost: Let’s face it, smart watches, glasses or even bulbs are not cheap. A pack of 3 smart bulbs is almost three times the cost of regular ones. It is great for us that companies are developing connected devices, but they will be of no use if the intended target audience is not able to afford them. Large selling prices is a very big threat looming over IoT and its growth.

I think it is only fair to say that IoT has its fair share of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Not all things about it are all good or all bad. But, we have to understand that the wave of connected devices is coming and we should be knowing about it as much as possible.

I hope the SWOT analysis done by me was up to the mark. If I have missed out any point, or if you have some feedback, drop me a comment below. If you liked the article, do share it on your social networks. Do check out our other articles that talk about the myths, obstacles and interesting facts about the Internet of Things.

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6 Interesting Facts about the Internet of Things

By on 07/01/2015   /   In-house content   /   8 Comments
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7 Interesting Facts about the Internet of Things
The Internet of Things has been a buzzword for a while now. People can’t seem to get enough of it. The possibility of living (kinda) like the Jetsons in this lifetime has people excited, and a little scared too. We live in interesting times.
Here are some facts and forecasts that may surprise you.

1. The value of IoT
Intel reports that as of 2025, it is possible that the worldwide value of the technology of IoT will be a whopping $6.2 trillion, with $2.5 trillion of this accounted for by health care and a further $2.3 trillion in manufacturing industries.

2. More connected devices than humans
The Internet of Things is rapidly evolving. Cisco estimates that 50 billion devices and objects will be connected to the Internet by 2020. What’s the estimated global population in 2020, you ask? Less than 8 billion!
Yet today, more than 99% of the things in the physical world remain unconnected. Bazinga!

3. There are 100 Internet addresses for every ATOM on the face of the earth!
We invented IPV6 because we knew we’d run out of IP addresses one day.
People lost their minds when Steve Leibson said in 2008, “We could assign an IPV6 address to every atom on the surface on the earth, and still have enough addresses left to do another 100+ earths. It isn’t remotely likely that we’ll run out of IPV6 addresses at any time in the future.” How cool is that?

4. Insecurities kill connections

It sounds cool to have smart gadgets but it also makes them more susceptible to getting hacked. Imagine a world in which your fridge refuses to make ice and your smoke alarm goes off randomly!
A year ago, a group of hackers used malware installed on over a hundred thousand devices to send out 750,000 virus-bearing spam emails. All this in less than a week! What raised eyebrows was that many of the devices in question weren’t computers or even smartphones. The victims were things that most people didn’t think were even capable of getting infected—televisions, home entertainment centers, and even a refrigerator!

5. Thrifty IoT
The report entitled “Machine-to-Machine Technologies: Unlocking the Potential of a $1 Trillion Industry” predicts that the technology could result in cost savings and new revenues worth 10-15 trillion USD over the next twenty years.

6. Save the environment? Check!
A new report by Carbon War Room and AT&T shows that IoT can save 2 billion tons of carbon emissions by 2020, while its applications in transportation and the operation of buildings and farms can slash greenhouse emissions by 7.1 billion tons.

The Internet of Things is already making waves. If these predictions come true, then the effect of IoT on the entire world will be enormous.

6 Interesting Facts about the Internet of Things
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Why can’t you play God just yet?- 7 Challenges in implementing the Internet of Things

By on 06/23/2015   /   In-house content  
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7 Challenges in implementing the Internet of Things

There’s no doubt that the Internet of Things is a groundbreaking evolution. Talking refrigerators, intelligent thermostats, health monitors environmental sensors, clever cars, brainy bridges and what not- it’s all quite fascinating. But how are companies going to follow through with the tall promises they’ve made to us? No matter how badly we want things at the flick of a wand, in reality, most IoT projects have severe feasibility issues. In a survey conducted by Dimensional Research, it was found that 96% of the companies surveyed faced challenges with their IoT projects. After all, building revolutionary stuff comes with a generous share of obstacles.

I’ve put together a bunch of reasons why companies are having a tough time.

1. Data management

Sensors all around collect data which is stored, analyzed and then inferences are made accordingly. That’s basically how IoT works. As time goes on and the number of sensors increases, mountains of data start accumulating. A lot of it could be unwanted data. The lack of space and dearth of adequate analytical tools start eating away at the efficiency and quality of the technology. In the study mentioned earlier, another key finding was that only 8% of the companies surveyed are fully capturing and analyzing data in a timely fashion. To deal with the exponential rise in data volume, companies will have to come up with novel ways to store it and analyze it to their benefit. This analyzed data is what ultimately results in revenue generation or cost savings for the organization.

Certain systems need to be in place to react to changes in real time. According to Capgemini, 60% of all British companies in a recent study felt they were not in a position to process sensor date in real time. The real-time processing of data in particular is frequently an unsatisfactorily resolved problem, as are the integration, analysis, and visualization of data

2. Upfront Investments

Innovativeness comes at a cost. Enormous capital investments will be needed to acquire the necessary technological prowess for applications that generate a lot of data. Gathering so much data will be in vain if the company doesn’t possess the capabilities to convert that data into valuable insights and make the right decisions. However, the hard part isn’t crunching the data; it’s connecting all the systems needed to paint a complete picture. Integration is tougher than analysis.

3. Not getting along

 At the heart of IoT lies connectivity. Everything must be connected in some way. But companies use different platforms and tools and getting legacy software to work with new technology is easier said than done. Accenture believes that the main challenge lies in getting current technology up to speed to accommodate the Internet of Things. Regardless of how much smarter and inexpensive the sensors are becoming, the lack of standards, suitable protocols for data transfer, compatible middleware and need for upgradation are big roadblocks in taking IoT to the next level.

4. Sensor energy

For IoT to reach its full potential, sensors will need to be self-sustaining. Imagine changing batteries in billions of devices deployed across the planet and even into space. Obviously, this isn’t possible. What’s needed is a way for sensors to generate electricity from environmental elements (such as vibrations, light, or airflow).

5. New skill set needed

There is a lack of Big Data experts who are able to interpret sensor data. Data scientists are rare and in great demand. The future of IoT is a grand vision indeed. Using cloud computing, Big Data analysis and blazing fast hardware, we might be able to make what we want. Brilliant minds making deeply complex stuff that needs mad skills, utmost dedication and a lot of time to build. What will you do when your fridge acts up and stops reminding you to buy milk? You’re going to need some highly qualified and knowledgeable tech support, no? There might come a time when one of the fifty devices strapped to your body malfunctions and nobody has a clue as to how to fix it. We are building things which might go beyond our understanding. It’s difficult for companies to find people with the required expertise to work on such advanced projects and then manage the customer support too. Customer queries are becoming increasingly complex and customers expect quick response times.

6. Security

Devices are increasingly getting connected to the internet and to each other. This makes them vulnerable to malicious attacks, no matter how unlikely it seems. The main cause for concern is not every individual thing in the internet of things (although those are hard to secure too), it’s those cloud servers that hold a ton of data collected from the connected devices. They could contain an array of personal information as well as an organization’s confidential information. Even local hubs where data is temporarily stored are hackable.

It is paramount that companies include security features as the top priority rather than as an addendum. Security breaches could result in widespread loss of privacy and tremendous damage- in terms of money, reputation and customer loyalty.

It was revealed in the 2015 Cost of Data Breach Study: Global Analysis report that the average consolidated total cost of a data breach is 3.8million USD. That’s a 23% increase since 2013. If implementing security mechanisms right now itself is so difficult, imagine the state of affairs when IoT reaches another level.

Organizations driving the IoT revolution have to find a way to make devices secure. After all, with great power, comes great responsibility.

7. Finding a killer application

This is another hiccup in developing IoT apps. A killer app becomes popular because you need it. A smartphone is unarguably the best example of a killer product. Think about how easily smartphones have carved a special place in our lives. Organizations are having a tough time coming up with something that will have people lining up and camping outside stores to buy it. A few years ago, one could have said that wearable devices might perhaps remain toys for the wealthy. But with all sorts of new startups coming up and the cost of hardware constantly decreasing, these devices are now quite affordable. But nothing has really gone viral yet. It’s going to be quite a challenge.

It is important to note that while barriers and challenges exist, they are not insurmountable. Given the benefits of IoT, companies will find a way to get these issues worked out. It is only a matter of time.

7 Challenges in implementing the Internet of Things

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8 Myths about the Internet of Things

By on 06/23/2015   /   In-house content  
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The Internet of Things is here to stay. Like any new concept, IoT brings with itself an array of misconceptions and myths. These myths will decide our viewpoint and our stand with respect to all things connected. We’ve put together a list of common misconceptions and tried to debunk them the best way we can.

1. IoT is just another piece of hardware
If IoT were a piece of hardware, new products would be shoved down our throats every 6 months. Thankfully, it’s not. IoT is a complete infrastructure comprising the software, network, physical sensors and the cloud.
Generally, a connected device observes our actions using sensors, transforms it into data, and transmits it over the network to the cloud platform where the data is analyzed. The decision made on the basis of this analyzed data triggers an action from the device in the real world.

2. The Internet of Things is a thing of the future
It was LG in 2000 to first come up with plans for a refrigerator connected to the internet aka implementing the internet of things in real life. So, the first time IoT was implemented,

  •  Microsoft released Windows 2000
  •  The entire world was divided on the Bush v/s Gore vote
  • Book stores were packed with the release of the 4th Harry Potter book.
  •  Napster came under the scanner for the first time.
    So, it’s been around for a while. Internet of Things has always been a vision to increase M2M interaction, but it needed investment in terms of men, money and materials to develop. Now, that it has started getting attention, we’ll see strides in this field. So, IoT is a thing of the present than the future.

3. My life will become Big Brother with the gag reel!
Privacy (Yes, I finally have your attention) has been an issue of tremendous economic, technical and moral importance. IoT skeptics are painting the town red talking about the privacy issues of connected devices with messages like: “Stop Now. You’ll repent later”. Kind of reminds you of those believers who ran amok crying “2012: Repent while there’s still time”.
For market movers hoping to make an impact with their design of IoT, privacy is a major concern. Current privacy infrastructure standards like VPN, DNS extensions can be used over the cloud. There are efforts to conform upon a standard to keep user data private. Today, organizations trust vendors with their enterprise data over the cloud. Organizations are aware of people’s concerns and are making a conscious effort to address them in the best way possible. So, if privacy is what’s holding you back, welcome to Team IoT.

4. You had me at security!
You imagine a future where every tiny detail about you, your activities is being recorded, analyzed and acted upon by several sensors. In such a scenario, security is of utmost importance.
Companies who plan to enter the market of connected devices will make security of user data a priority. With Google announcing Brillo, Apple & Microsoft working on custom operating systems for their wearables and their protection, security should be the least of your worries.

5. Industrial IoT is the same as consumer IoT
Industrial IoT refers to the deployment of connected devices designed specifically to automate an industry or a particular process of the same. Industrial IoT differs from consumer IoT in all facets like the level of security, privacy, integration with legacy software, response to failure, etc.
Consumer IoT is probably the simplest form of IoT as the possibilities for it are endless. Industrial IoT on the other hand is a lot more complex and needs careful planning and implementation. If your smart fridge fails to deliver as expected, the issue can be resolved in the next update. But, if a component in an industry fails to perform, the implications could be disastrous.

6. Interoperability is simply impossible to achieve
One concept will put to rest all doubts about interoperability: Open Source. You wouldn’t want to purchase a smart thermostat only to find it incompatible with your smartphone. After all, ease of use is the bottom line for IoT.
Vendors like ARM plan to make their IoT standards public. Open Source designs and software will enable different vendors to make products interoperable. Several Open Source summits are being organized. Recently, giants like Apple, Microsoft joined Facebook’s Open Source project to provide designs for their data center.

7. The Data will be impossible to handle
The upcoming wave of IoT products plans to bring along an avalanche of data with it. Some argue that the process of data storage, management and analysis will be an uphill task, maybe even impossible.
But, experts say that not all data needs to be sent over to the device or cloud to be analyzed. A smart device like a thermostat will take an action to reduce or increase the temperature only when the present conditions change. Hence, the garbage data can be eliminated, sending only the data related to a state change. Implementation of such logic can reduce the cost of data management. (Source)

8. IoT is feasible only for the market giants and not startups
Many startups get disheartened by the costs of investing in the Internet of Things. But, in reality the cost of developing an IoT solution is lesser that you think.
The declining hardware costs and Open Source standards that implement interoperability are key drivers in reducing the cost of IoT development. So, in the world of IoT a startup and a Fortune 500 company are at even footing.

I hope I have been able to bust some myths about the Internet of Things through the article. If I have missed out any point or if you have any feedback, drop me a comment below.

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