The Arrow IoT Summit 2017 was held in Vantaa, Finland in May 18th. The event gathered over 600 participants to discover the status of IoT field in Finland. According to Arrow´s IoT Director Europe Andrew Bickley Fog Computing extends cloud computing and services to the edge of the network. With this, companies can save time and money by automation and real time reactions. Efficiency and security add value for business. The most common reasons for deploying IoT are reducing risks and optimizing operations (451 Research, Voice of the Enterprise IoT Budgets and Outlook 2017). Arrow´s research shows that in Finland the customer satisfaction and product quality are the most valid reasons for developing IoT (Arrow, The Status of IoT in Finland 2017).
IoT as a part of business
IoT field is like a mesh. It might be tricky to understand the details because the field is growing and evolving. There are many companies producing components and sensors without intelligence. This event focused on connecting platforms, applications and manufactures for finding new business ideas. You can say that IoT has a bright future: The market is growing and sensors and devices as well as tools to analyze data are getting better and cheaper. This brings more revenue and value for the market.
IoT into the cloud & Analysis
But the analysis and storage of IoT data still requires more attention from companies. As a report by 451 Research, over 55 % of companies send their generated IoT data to company owned or leased data center facilities. Only 18 % of companies send their IoT data to public cloud infrastructure. Also 39 % of companies don´t transport their IoT data in between initial storage and where it is eventually kept and stored. Over 35 % of companies transport the data to company owned or leased data center facilities. If the data would be in the cloud, the company could react in real time for any wanted request and use enormous amount of data in no time. Hosted cloud platforms would also allow companies to take quickly advantage of advanced features such as machine learning. In the other words, efficient usage of clouds and platforms are shortening the distance.
All in all companies should take advantage of smart enabling technology, smart predictive analytics and smart industry, energy or city to gain success (VTT 2017). This is achieved best by leveraging partners and platforms who make best of breed products from the sensor level to the data analysis platform. The key word is interconnection, not just between components but by building partnerships between companies.
