The Internet of Things offers great potential for organisations and societies. A connected world where billions, or even trillions, of devices are connected to the Internet and as such can communicate with each other. If we manage to successfully develop the Internet of Things it will unlock a lot of value and the benefits of the Internet of Things are enormous for organisations and societies.
However, there are still some major challenges for the Internet of Things. Organisations will be able to track their assets in real time, improve utilisation of the assets to meet demand. They will be able to predict required maintenance without visiting remote devices such as windmills, saving money on for example helicopter trips. Monetization of expensive assets becomes easier for organisation as the Internet of Things will enable operating expenditure instead of capital expenditure; meaning that users of certain assets are billed based on their actual usage, engine hours, and fuel load etc. instead of having to purchase expensive assets. In addition, devices that are connected to the Internet can receive software updates regularly, instead of replacing the asset thereby prolonging the life of the asset. There are already many different examples of products that are connected to the Internet.
Although the most potential is for manufacturers to connect machines to the Internet, the most visible to the consumer are consumer-related products. What about Cuptime, a Chinese Internet-enabled cup that measures hydration levels. Or the Stir Kinetic Desk that keeps you fit, energized, and inspired by moving from a seating position to a standing position automatically and tracking how many calories you have burned. The company Skully Helmets has created and augmented reality motorcycle helmet with rear-viewing possibilities. The examples are almost endless and the website Postscapes has a list with a lot more connected devices. These examples of connected devices shows the potential of the Internet of Things, but we are still a long way away from a truly connected world. There are several major challenges that impact a broad implementation of the Internet of Things:
The Internet of Things will be a complex structure of hardware, sensors, applications and devices that need to be able to communicate geographically and across verticals. Especially for supply chains this requires shared standards to exchange data across different organisations. The success of the Internet of Things will be determined by the existence of such, global, standards. A large consortium of the biggest players in the market is working on developing such standards. AT&T, Cisco, IBM, Intel and GE have formed an Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) to improve the integration of the physical and the digital world. The IIC, founded in 2014, combines and manages the efforts of governments, organisations and academia to catalyse, coordinate and manage programs that will lead to the right standards for the Industrial Internet, or the Internet of Things for manufactures.
