Run The Connected Business with IoT
Sep 14, 2017
The Growing Trend in IoT
Technology has grown far and beyond revolutionary. It has evolved in so many ways and influenced the way we conduct our daily activities and the content we consume on a daily basis. Technology has empowered us to not only connect to anyone, but also to anything, all in real-time. Part of this evolution that enables people to digitally connect and interact with the things around them is what Internet-of-Things (IoT) is all about.
Based on the recent Gartner studies on IoT, it is projected that the spending on this technology will reach a combined total of US$471 billion for professional services, consumer needs, and overall connectivity services by year 2020, which is about 20% CAGR from 20151. With this demand on spending on the technology, enterprises need to provide compatible devices to support the needs of the market; thus, it is projected that there will be US$6.5 billion shipments of IoT endpoints by year 20202. In terms of activation, it is projected that there will be US$63 million new devices activated per second, all within enterprises and consumer products by year 20203.
This trend has evolved due to increased connectivity within consumers who are always on the go and consumes huge volumes of data through their mobile devices. The growth is also affected by societal and infrastructure improvements that enable connectivity for better and faster access as they integrate and utilise IoT solutions.
IoT Business Impact
Businesses have determined IoT to be a technological innovation that will greatly shape the way companies operate. May it be internal factors that run the business, or external initiatives geared towards the consumers, businesses will greatly benefit on the evolution of IoT as it continues to grow and shape the technology landscape.
Automation
The implementation of automated processes has been a breakthrough in business technology, and through the emergence of IoT, companies can take advantage of this for better management and analysis of all processes. Data collection will be easier and more accurate which will greatly benefit company decisions and business plans. Automation will also provide companies with full control of their processes, minimising human errors, and allowing them to access critical information on-the-go through mobile devices.
Efficient Use of Resources
Maximising the full potential of company resources is what businesses aim to achieve by seamlessly processing and minimising unnecessary operational expenses. Through an efficient use of IoT technology, businesses can create effective ways for physical resources to work harmoniously with IoT solutions. This minimises the operational costs and conserves valuable resource utilisation, which allows companies to make critical decisions a lot more efficiently.
Enhancing Customer Services
Through the innovations and the extensive mobile influence brought upon by IoT, come a new way for businesses to reach out and communicate to their target customers. Through IoT and the analytics it generates, businesses can create new ways to provide customers with a more interactive user experience based on their behaviour, making it more personal and convenient for customers. This also enables companies to provide a better quality of service to enhance brand loyalty and generate new leads for their services as they create a positive emotional response.
Capturing Valuable Data
Mission critical processes are important information companies need to monitor on a daily basis to make sure the business runs smoothly. Through the innovations of IoT, businesses can mend devices and technology together to create intelligent systems that they can use internally. This is crucial to make sure that any real-time changes that affect the business are captured and addressed immediately, enabling the company to predict and make important decisions based on the data and insights gathered.
Innovative Services
As companies adopt IoT technologies and take advantage of their application possibilities through mobile devices and other consumer products, businesses can upgrade their products through innovative value added services. Capturing important analytics and data through IoT, companies can understand their consumers and current products as well as be able to produce new and better product offerings, further enhancing customer experience.
Effective IoT Implementation
Companies that desires to adopt IoT technologies in their own business process need to make sure that they follow best practises to maximise its full potential. Management should keep check of the important principles in implementing IoT.
IoT solutions should be implemented on a unified platform for quality and performance consistency as well as to make it efficient to re-deploy the solution on demand. This will save a lot of time and effort for the management teams on how they utilise the solutions on a daily basis. Businesses should also consider flexibility in the implementation of IoT solutions as such companies should look into an open eco-system setup of managing overall processes. Management should be open in the possibility of tapping into open sources, possible vendors, or to look into in-house development to minimise costs and for a faster deployment of solutions.
Companies should also deploy heterogeneous software applications since IoT technology demands a lot of resources due to data processing and analytical computing. Using more than one kind of processors or cores, these kinds of applications can gain better performance and energy efficiency which businesses can greatly benefit as they utilise IoT technology. These heterogeneous applications can be deployed on a public cloud, a private cloud, or on premise, depending on the access demand of the business. Considering the complexity of IoT technology and the massive data that comes with it, companies should take into account the data protection and end-to-end security of the information they are using. This ensures confidentiality and minimises any security breach since cyber security is prevalent in the technology sphere today.
Considering that companies are moving to the cloud and adopting IoT technology in general, it is inevitable that businesses should maximise the use of devices and communication networks to tap into the technology. Managing these devices and communication networks should therefore use managed services for flexibility in running these IoT solutions. This makes it easier for businesses to monitor and track the efficiency of the solution and generate sound decisions in real-time as they can access the data anywhere, anytime.
Infinitum IoT Platform
PCCW Solutions values the business impact of IoT technologies and has the right expertise and knowledge in the proper implementation of IoT solutions. PCCW Solutions’ Infinitum IoT platform has integrated all these best practises for companies to realise and maximise the benefits of IoT technology. In combining smart products with value added digital services and its companion APIs, the Infinitum IoT platform creates a seamless union of sensors, devices, and machine learning capabilities for a complete end-to-end solution.
Our Smart Parking and Charging solution is a complete driver mobility solution that integrates in-car devices to mobile devices for an enhanced customer experience. This enables operators to allow specific parking spaces to be reserved, navigated to and paid for, as well as providing operators with increased occupancy management and the potential to support sharing of private spaces and associated revenue share models.
It enables operators to monitor and control specific charging stations for electric enabled smart cars. Besides being a source of power for electric vehicles, the solution also acts as an intelligent charging network with automated metring and payment systems. This enables charging operators to remotely manage its usage and billing under multiple subscription and payment methods. The cumulative data gathered and fed into the neural networks of the CRM interface, enables operators an unprecedented view of customer behaviour through big-data analytics. This empowers them to make informed decisions and improved profitability.
1 Gartner report “Forecast Analysis: Internet of Things – Services, Worldwide, 2016 Update” From 21 February 2017
https://www.gartner.com/document/3616117?ref=solrAll&refval=181649476&qid=c8234ff410b89716979e7d987506955e
2 Gartner report “Forecast: Internet of Things – Endpoints and Associated Services, Worldwide, 2016” From 29 December 2016
https://www.gartner.com/document/3558917?ref=solrAll&refval=179793207&qid=0d7d1a034bc0cf0841886320df887f78
3 Gartner report “2017 Strategic Roadmap for IoT Network Technology” From 30 January 2017
https://www.gartner.com/document/3587517?ref=projectKI&refval=10699
Related Insights
CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
