There’s no denying that the “Hype” is real when it comes to the Internet of Things as it continues to promise groundbreaking things that will transform everyday life. However, despite the promise of wonders beyond comprehension, the pace of delivery and the adoption of IoT has underwhelmed massively. That is cause for concern for several people in the industry because it is clear when you look at all the signs that there is an underlying problem.
The ‘Internet of Things’ is a broad term, and the entire idea of IoT has been oversold massively with some wildly inaccurate claims being thrown in for good measure. It’s all connected from your bathroom mats to your underwear, and that simply isn’t exciting for people since they can’t see the application. Experts believe the problem lies in trying to oversell IoT and pushing too hard with wild predictions about what it will do and how it will impact lives.
Trying to Make Sense of the IoT End Game
When talking about IoT, the emphasis must be placed on the goals that it can help achieve instead of talking about the processes it will be involved in. For instance, if you’re interested in losing weight, you can do that by reducing food waste, monitoring your food consumption, exercising, and so on, which is something that IoT can help you with. However, you’re not going to be interested in the mechanism as your motivation would be the end result, and that’s something that isn’t being talked about.
This is true when it comes to consumers, and even businesses must start thinking about it. Most experts working with IoT believe that that the alarmingly slow pace of delivery wasn’t anticipated, and that has had an impact on IoT adoption. There is still a surprising lack of awareness about IoT among 25% of small to medium-sized businesses, with 10% of businesses not even engaged with the idea of adopting the Internet of Things.
The biggest hurdle facing the IoT challenge is that there has been immense ‘Hype’ generated surrounding IoT, and never-ending discussions about what IoT can do for industries without any proof that it can actually do that. It’s difficult to find out how companies that have adopted and integrated IoT have benefited in terms of cost savings or got significant advantages over their competitors.
The Complexity of IoT is It’s Biggest Challenge
From the outskirts, IoT is a gleaming piece of gold that promises to revolutionize lives; however, it is only when you investigate how it will bring about that change do you start realizing how complex it is. IoT is a complex ecosystem with variable technology instead of the singular, manageable entity that it actually is. It’s not only about connectivity but instead relies on data analytics, IoT security products, cloud services, and overcoming a massive skills gap to handle these things.
So, even when you’ve got the data, there’s no clear way to understand what you should do with it, and that’s one of the biggest reasons why IoT has faltered so drastically. There are several companies that are still coming to terms with what IoT is, but most of them are reluctant to admit they don’t know anything about their implementation and adoption.
However, when you look at companies that have embraced IoT and have integrated it into their internal systems, you find out that there’s no use of the internet. That makes the name ‘Internet of Things’ confusing, but that’s not unusual because people were confused about the cloud too. The companies that have invested heavily in IoT have taken a tailored approach, but it is an expensive approach because of the price reductions and volume that comes with it.
Big corporations are the most likely to adopt and integrate IoT into their infrastructure and business architecture due to the cost issues. The integration and adoption of IoT is a long-term project, and most small companies don’t have the long-term vision to see it through.
Market Growth Will Drive New Products
There are a lot of companies that have already started down the path of arranging their readiness for IoT implementation and adoption. It also helps that there are now more IoT suppliers raising awareness through proofs of concept and trials, but the talk surrounding IoT needs to be less technical. Finding success is going to drive growth, and that will only come about when these suppliers start to focus not only on raising awareness but on making deployment easier as well.
That will not only raise confidence but will generate momentum that can be maintained. One of the biggest challenges faced by IoT is that of security, and even though experts believe that IoT is going to make a massive impact, no one quite knows how to handle that conundrum. That’s because there are not a lot of technology around that can deal with this problem.
It’s a classic chicken and egg case, as once the market is established, the products are going to start coming in. At the risk of adding more fuel to the ‘Hype,’ the market is well on its way, and it has been predicted that between 2018 and 2028, the number of global IoT connections will grow sevenfold to a mind-boggling 5.7 billion! That will outpace the growth of smartphones over that period, which is a positive sign that the IoT industry is here to stay.
Most experts are aware that there are going to be massive teething problems during the process, but with newer ideas surrounding IoT adoption and integration, it will grow and develop exponentially.