3 Upcoming IoT trends that will change how your business works
TOP 3 upcoming IoT business trends that will shape your future soon. Scroll down and read on !
IoT, or the Internet of Things is a revolutionary concept that has helped billions of electronic devices connect, communicate and control each other. It has created a myriad applications among emerging IoT trends and IoT ideas- from lighting smart bulbs to anticipating maintenance activities before emergencies. Yet, we are just getting started with IoT. As more and more devices connect with each other, the possibilities with IoT ideas are endless.
PwC predicts that there will be over 64 Billion IoT devices across the world by the year 2025. That is over 9 times the estimates of current human population. The global spending on IoT ideas for consumer-centric, business-centric and government purposes will amount to $1.5 Trillion by the year 2020. Over 50% of this amount ($750 Billion) is expected to be invested by businesses across the globe.
Businesses across the world today are relying on innovative IoT ideas to succeed in their respective marketplaces. So with that in mind, here are the top upcoming IoT business trends and IoT ideas which will change how they function and adapt themselves:
IoT-enabled user experiences
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User experience, or UX is one of the top priorities of digitally-powered businesses. Over the years, the major mediums of digital interaction have transformed from computers to smartphones. Now with people surrounded by all kinds of IOT devices around them, we’re moving towards IOT ideas encouraging screenless, yet seamless modes of user experience.
“The best interface is no interface”
- Golden Krishna (Design strategist at Google)
A great example of the future of UX is Domino’s Zero Click app. It basically does exactly what the name of the app says- confirming an order for a Pizza without the user making a single click. All a user has to do is to open the app and not close it for at least 10 seconds, and then the order would be confirmed for delivery within 30 minutes! While this isn’t an IoT specific use case, we’re not too far from seeing apps that trigger various functionalities for devices connected to an IoT network.
One of the prime carriers towards this shift to screenless UX are voice-based virtual assistants such as the Google Assistant and Alexa. These voice-powered devices are by themselves a powerful IoT device, and can act as a bridge to help users interact with other IoT devices.
As of this moment, the future with voice powered assistants seems a bit blurry due to two key reasons. One of that we don’t really have a game-changing player with unique IoT ideas in this segment except for the two companies mentioned above. Two, for what it’s worth- voice-powered UX has definitely brought in new IoT ideas, however it’s yet to bring in something truly revolutionary like the first ever iPhone.
IoT data as a source of Revenue
With the proliferation of IoT devices, we now have an unprecedented amount of data, so much that we don’t really know what to do we with it. But with the use of emerging technologies and IoT trends such as machine learning, trained algorithms can tell us a lot about the needs of end-consumers.
This allows for IoT data can be used for purposes that benefit the end-consumer. Imagine having an IoT sensor equipped on a product you’re selling to a customer. Now if the sensor detects any malfunction on the product, then you, the seller, could also be a recipient to the data collected by the sensor.
Being a recipient of such data could mean that you could connect with your customers at a deeper level by offering them solutions to help them avoid issues with their purchased products.
In this particular case, you can open additional portals of revenue by offering your customers support services from experts that will pay you a commission for getting them a new task to work on.
Sounds familiar eh? This is exactly what Google has been doing for so many years in the digital realm- collecting user data, then sending it to those who can market themselves to the user for serving their mutual needs.
This does not only apply to consumer-centric IoT trends & business opportunities. There are many IoT ideas that can also be used for improving business processes and operations (You can take the help of IOT application development companies). In turn, these ideas will improve the efficiency of business workflow in the longer run, and save huge amount of monetary resources to be used for other purposes. For the best results you should hire IoT developers from your prefered country may it be USA, India, Canada, many more.
Businesses will either go open-source or create monopolistic IoT ecosystems
Microsoft’s increasing contributions to the open-source GitHub platform indicate how large-scale companies are now realizing the potential of open-source development
A fundamental principle on which businesses run is the principle of retaining customers. Be it a B2C business or a B2B one, all of them want their customers to come back for more. One of the most well-known methods to retain or maintain existing customers is to build an ecosystem of products/services that traps in those using them.
To understand this better, think of those who own or have used an iPhone (possibly you too). Apple mostly produces and sells proprietary hardware & software products. The proprietary nature is easily reflected in the way its devices function. They can have iMessages run on every device using iOS/MacOS (which, again, isn’t allowed to be used anywhere except on apple devices). But cannot have the popular messaging app on say, an android phone.
For those who start loving features such as iMessage on their apple devices, it becomes really hard to switch to another alternative and live with it. This is what happens with nearly everyone who chooses to purchase an apple device- they get trapped into the ecosystem of devices offered by the company.
Having a closed ecosystem built around a customer isn’t too bad unless it affects their convenience. In fact, such closed ecosystems are what made the Apple brand as unique and premium it seems to be today.
However, when it comes to trends in IoT, closed ecosystems can eventually become a limitation for those using it. This limitation comes from the fact that unlike ecosystem of specific services or products, a network of IoT devices can spread much farther, and limiting that reach would only put a halt to its potential.
It’s similar to how even a largely-independent company such as apple had to open source their Swift programming language in order to have more developers work on it to build innovative applications.
Mazzimo Banzi, CTO and Founder of Arduino describes it best:
“If the infrastructural pieces [behind a technology] are open source, you can potentially have millions of pairs of eyeballs looking at the same problem”.
Having a larger audience of specialists work on something opens doorways to unique IoT ideas and unique IoT applications. This consequently results in more business opportunities for every competitor in the industry. Ah, beauty of the free marketplace!
Summary
To summarize, these three major trends in IoT are poised to change how businesses function worldwide. The need for innovative user experiences will lead to proliferation of voice-powered assistive services, instant service delivery apps, among others.
At the same time, businesses will seek to gain more insights on consumers’ preferences with IoT. By leveraging AI tools along with it, big data analytics will open up new business opportunities, spawn new IoT ideas and make markets more competitive than ever before.
With the expansion of IoT, Large enterprises might try to build custom IoT solutions to get their target audience into an ecosystem. But eventually they will fail as they see SMEs and startups leverage open source technologies to catapult themselves at par with the big giants. This will perhaps make large companies such as Apple realize the potential of open-source (Just like how Microsoft has understood the same), and we may see companies such as those embracing them wholeheartedly.
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