Microsoft Simplifies And Streamlines IoT With Launch Of Plug And Play

The internet of things (IoT) seems to be everywhere these days—from smart thermostats to video doorbells to connected refrigerators all the way to industrial control systems (ICS) to streamline manufacturing and enable centralized management and monitoring of critical infrastructure. As ubiquitous as IoT seems, though, the skills necessary to design and implement an effective IoT solution are beyond the capabilities of most companies. Microsoft—working with a who’s who of industry partners—just launched IoT Plug and Play to drastically simplify and democratize IoT and make it accessible for everyone.

Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of the Cloud and Enterprise group for Microsoft, revealed a number of new initiatives ahead of the Build conference—which takes place next week. Guthrie talks about automated machine learning, Azure Cognitive Services and more. Guthrie also shared, “In addition, we’re announcing IoT Plug and Play, a new open modeling language to connect IoT devices to the cloud seamlessly, enabling developers to navigate one of the biggest challenges they face — deploying IoT solutions at scale. Previously, software had to be written specifically for the connected device it supported, limiting the scale of IoT deployments. IoT Plug and Play provides developers with a faster way to build IoT devices and will provide customers with a large ecosystem of partner-certified devices that can work with any IoT solution.”

I had an opportunity to speak with Sam George, director of Azure IoT for Microsoft, about IoT Plug and Play. He described how the evolution and implementation of the concept mirrors the Plug and Play effort for Windows devices. As PC ownership skyrocketed and the volume and diversity of peripherals and devices to connect to Windows PCs exploded, many businesses and individuals experienced confusion and frustration trying to get everything connected and working properly. Device Plug and Play fixed that by implementing a device capability model that allowed devices to announce their attributes and capabilities so Windows could automatically assign and configure them.

IoT Plug and Play works much the same way. George explained that the IoT Plug and Play capability model is built using a JSON-LD (JavaScript Object Notation for Linked Data) schema to enable devices to describe the functions and capabilities they support. IoT Plug and Play can then automatically generate software for the device based on the Plug and Play specification.

IoT Plug and Play enables Microsoft’s hardware partners to build IoT Plug and Play compatible devices, which can then be certified with the Azure Certified for IoT program and used by customers and partners simply and quickly. Microsoft stated that IoT Plug and Play support is open source and works with devices running any operating system, including Linux, Android, the Azure Sphere OS, Windows IoT, RTOSs, and more.

Microsoft recognizes the strength and importance of working with its partner ecosystem. There are a number of device manufacturers and solution providers already on board with the IoT Plug and Play effort.

I had a chance to talk with two of the partners—Octonion and Askey. Ongan Mordeniz, COO of Octonion, told me that many organizations are frustrated with a gap between device and cloud skill sets. Octonion created the Brainium Core Software to help developers quickly deliver IoT and AI-based end-to-end solutions. Mordeniz told me that working with Microsoft and being part of the Microsoft Azure IoT Plug and Play program will enable Octonion to drive the IIoT (industrial IoT) market forward and speed up the time it takes to develop a minimally viable product from an average of 18-24 months down to about 6 months.

I also spoke to Archer Chiu, Head of Cloud, and John Cheng, Head of Product for Askey.