Proactive enterprises are embracing the Internet of Things (IoT) to differentiate products, transform operations and enable new business models. Over the past few years, IoT – or the connectivity and visibility of smart devices – has been a rapidly growing trend around the world. In a recent report by Gartner, the IoT industry is expected to be worth $300 billion globally and the number of connected devices would hit 27 billion by 2020. In India alone, the IoT industry will cross $15 billion in the same time, according to Indian government estimates, and the country is expected to form 5-6 percent share of the global IoT industry.
In view of the importance of this new technology megatrend, the Indian government released a draft policy that aims at building an entire ecosystem around IoT and incentivising the players in the ecosystem. This has further helped to place India on the global IoT map.
Offering real-time visibility
Today, technology fundamentally defines the strategy of any business and it is IoT that creates the interaction between technology and strategy. As IoT gains momentum, the implications for business model innovations are huge. To stay relevant and ahead of the competition, organizations need to be agile in adopting new technologies such as mobile computing, IoT and cloud-based computing. Together, these megatrends are driving the growing category called Enterprise Asset Intelligence, which enables organizations to gain real-time visibility into their most important assets – from cargo to vehicle fleets to their people.
Enterprises in every vertical are looking at increasing their visibility by adopting IoT technologies to solve their business problems – including cost control, energy consumption and machinery downtime. This will lead to increased efficiency, customer satisfaction and, ultimately, bottom lines.
Apart from tracking assets, the use of IoT allows organizations to capture and analyze data (such as foot traffic in a retail mall) about their customers. With enhanced business insights, they are able to make more informed and faster business decisions to improve customer engagement.
Creating new value through IoT
In order to leverage the benefits of IoT, it is imperative to understand the IoT’s impact on organizations and its deployment. This will enable organizations to better prepare themselves for the move into this area. With IoT, businesses can now create value and manage an information value loop, one that is facilitated by increasingly complex business ecosystems. Talking about the Indian market, the shift from a traditional enterprise IT architecture to one augmented for IoT may not be as daunting as it may seem. Businesses need to refine and redesign their IT and wireless network architectures to support billions of interdependent processing events per year from millions of products, devices, and applications. Seamless connectivity as well as collaboration across business units will become a must-have.
IoT has presented businesses with massive opportunities. It’s not a new phrase but instead a term which has been making rounds in the technology landscape for years. Any device that communicates with other machines is an IoT application. The solutions offered should help organizations communicate with their assets, be it people or devices. Here is how various industries in India can benefit from Enterprise Asset Intelligence:
- Retailers will be able to build a consistent customer experience by providing them a seamless shopping experience. They will be able to have better visibility in terms of how many people visit the shop on a daily basis, insights into what customers bought from the store in the past, what customers are interested in and other similar data. These insights will enhance the customer experience.
- Manufacturers will be able to capture, track and trace materials and verify parts and production schedules. They’ll be able to improve inventory controls, boost productivity and ensuring materials get where they need to go.
- Healthcare sector will have advanced tracking and asset management capabilities which would be able to enhance efficiencies in hospitals and provide patients and caregivers with a mistake-free, safe treatment environment, and
- Transportation and Logistics sector would be able to track their vehicles efficiently and accurately by using real-time data to optimize routing and ensuring delivery of all assets to its final destination.
What businesses need are technologies that give virtual voices to their assets, people and transactions, enabling them to unlock greater business value. And there’s no better time than now to start looking at how your organization can reap the benefits of enterprise IoT.
Deep is the regional sales director, India, Zebra Technologies Asia Pacific
