TBR 2020 Devices & Commercial IoT Predictions: IoT settles in for the long hual

IoT becomes part of the digital transformation family, and conversational user interfaces become more common

IoT continues to mature. This is reflected in more powerful and easier-to-implement IoT software and cloud services as well as in a greater understanding of what IoT is and what it is good for. Vendors and customers now better understand the role of IoT and the more common use cases and expect IoT to be used where appropriate.

For most vendors, IoT is no longer a differentiating headline; instead, it is included as one of the techniques or technologies, either as part of larger offerings or as specific IoT-oriented components. An increasing number of offerings are complete packaged solutions or customizable bundles that include or feature IoT. Though IoT is maturing and growing as a percentage of vendor revenue, it is less often standing alone as a spotlighted capability.

TBR’s IoT predictions from 2019 were confirmed, and these trends will continue through 2020 and beyond:

The IoT ecosystem will sort itself out; vendors will find their niches

Increasingly, vendors are messaging their specific offerings as requiring the integration of other vendors’ offerings to create complete solutions, or they are joining with other vendors’ offerings to deliver bundled and packaged solutions.

Packaged and bundled IoT solutions will proliferate

There is an increasing number of bundled and packaged solutions on the market, offered by component vendors, integrators and operations technology (OT) vendors. One type of packaged solution is enhancements to existing software packages that tap IoT as an extension of their capabilities.

Not all data is valuable: Data economics will drive design

Several vendors, including Dell Technologies and a prominent India-based systems integrator, reported that most of the data generated in IoT solutions is discarded shortly after it is analyzed and used. We believe the challenge over the next several years will be identifying data worth keeping, condensing and summarizing, and then storing it, socializing it and discarding it according to a data life cycle plan.

In the past, IoT was intimidating to both vendors and customers, as the opportunities appeared endless while there were few demonstrated use cases. As a landscape of use cases emerged, as IoT component and platform offerings matured, and as vendors gathered experience in IoT, it has become easier for customers and vendors to identify opportunities for IoT, and to design and deploy solutions. IoT describes one broad class of use cases among the variety of possible non-IoT situation-specific solutions and has become part of the vast number of available digital transformation solutions.

2020 Predictions:

• There will be less talk of IoT as it will be increasingly viewed as one technique among many for delivering digital transformation
• AI in IoT will increasingly be encapsulated in specific functions like recognition and detection
• Conversational user interfaces, based on voice or typed communication, will play an increasing role in business solutions

Register for TBR’s 2020 Devices & Commercial IoT webinar, IoT settles in for the long haul, Feb. 5, 2020.

Technology Business Research 2020 Predictions is a special series examining market trends and business changes in key markets. Covered segments include telecom, cloud, devices & commercial IoT, data center, and services.