Who needs a new IoT Blog?

When I as a practitioner survey the current landscape of IoT I am surprised by the continuous state of 'infancy' of the IoT industry. Five years ago IoT was full of promise and hope and there was a lot of activity by critical components for creating this new industry - startups, established companies, semiconductor manufacturers, cloud services, new industrial devices and consumer products. Yes, IoT was ascending towards the top of Gartner's 'hype cycle' as research reports, consultants and conferences were touting the Internet of Things as the next new 'revolution' in high tech! Five years later the euphoria has disappeared and the 'wind seems to have gone out of the IoT sails'. During the last three years the IoT industry has been at a virtual stand-still (with a couple of key exceptions). What happened?

What happened is that reality set in - IoT was not just an extension of the Internet where any individual or business could set up a web site in a matter of days or weeks and have it reachable by any web browser in the world in a matter of minutes. Not only did IoT actually mean developing a product 'Thing -IoT Device' and have it connect reliably to the Internet, it also involved managing the data to and from each IoT device as well as managing all IoT devices associated with a company or application. A company wanting to introduce IoT into their business suddenly had to become knowledgeable in areas like connectivity and data management and start to manage thousands (hopefully leading to millions) of IoT devices connected to their IoT solution. It is as if they had to learn how to connect products and run small network operations centers and learn how to manage data and information, all at the same time. Very few companies had all these skills, and even if they had them, they were unaware that in order to successfully capitalize on IoT, they would not only have to invest in the initial development of IoT products, applications solutions and the associated service infrastructure to run the IoT business. They would also have an ongoing expense to operate the business. Add to this that few companies had all the knowledge and skills required, so they became dependent on a combination of suppliers, consultants and advisers - all who walked away when the sale was done or the engagement over.

Little wonder that IoT seems stalled in it's tracks for the last couple of years.

Differing from many other hyped businesses, I firmly believe that IoT will happen and truly become the next frontier of the Internet.

In my IoT insight blog (gnosis is the greek work for personal insight), I will share my personal insights about the evolving IoT business.

Mats Samuelsson
GM - IoTgnosis


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