IoT: Everything Talking to Everything Else
Are you curious about the Internet of Things (IoT) and how it might factor into your business?
The Internet of Things is transformative for business because there’s a whole world of IoT that is suited to commercial, industrial, or infrastructure contexts.
Let’s explain what IoT is, in the first place. The Internet of Things (IoT) starts with devices (things) that are fitted with sensors to collect data and then connect to a network that can be on servers or in the cloud. The incoming data is then processed and analyzed, so the network can make data-driven decisions and initiate smart actions.
Recent technological advances have lowered the cost of deploying IoT, plus we’ve found new ways of processing the vast amounts of data these systems generate. So what once was possible but expensive is now broadly accessible to everyone.
With IoT, you get extraordinary visibility into connected devices, which enables the devices to use artificial intelligence to make informed choices. This can even happen at the outer edges of a network, skipping the need to check in with a centralized system. Think of it as using spinal reflexes when you need to make fast decisions versus relying on your brain to tell you that burner is hot.
Visibility can also give organizational leaders insights about business processes and customer needs, and potentially open new business opportunities.
Here are a few examples of IoT concepts:
- In a connected city, smart buses can talk to smart traffic lights, which will adjust their operation to make sure traffic flows quickly and doesn’t snarl up in trouble spots. A smart bus can talk to a monitoring station to inform operators that the engine is running below peak performance and should be tuned up. Predictive maintenance is better than preventive maintenance, and both are better than dealing with unexpected breakdowns, emergency repairs, and disgruntled transit customers.
- In healthcare, people living with diabetes might be fitted with smart insulin pumps that measure blood sugar in real-time and dispense the optimal dose of insulin while sending data to the healthcare provider. This could enable patients and doctors to prioritize health maintenance, preventing illness and unnecessary emergency room visits. Imagine improving patient and caregiver experience while reducing healthcare costs, thanks to connected devices.
- Global supply chains could be connected from end-to-end, with smart warehouses sending signals to shippers and manufacturers to replenish items before they run out. How much down-time could we prevent if parts arrived just before they were needed.
IoT is still new technology, and organizations are learning how best to use the vast information that IoT generates. According to CMS Wire, there are 50 billion connected devices in circulation, generating 50 zettabytes of information. That’s 10 to the 21st power, which is 1 billion terabytes or 1 trillion gigabytes. And yet our networks analyze only 1% of that data.
How much data do we need to collect? At the moment, we are collecting more information than we need to run the models and algorithms. So in the short term, we are over-collecting data, and as we learn more, we’ll know what to eliminate to save more time, energy, and money.
There is one important caution, though, and that is security. With everything connected to everything else, the potential to hack into a system from anywhere at any time increases exponentially. So it’s important to create robust, redundant security measures when you start taking advantage of the enormous potential of IoT technology.
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