2025 in Review: From Calamity, to Promise and Peril

The year began in beaten down mode with industry analysts reporting on shrinking IoT businesses and ‘calamitous’ exits. In the first case, Germany’s Software AG was the culprit for divesting its Cumolocity industrial IoT interests. A few days later, U-blox announced that it could not find a buyer for its cellular IoT business and would therefore shut down the entity. Citing several other corporate exits, LightReading positioned this as the latest IoT calamity to hit the industry.  

Matters did improve over the course of the year, aided by Vodafone’s ambitions to ‘hyperscale’ IoT and examples of making IoT more accessible via generative AI tools. While there are upsides to these developments, they raise concerns about IoT vulnerabilities. As we will see though other industry developments over 2025, there is always a flip side to the success that comes from economy-wide adoption of IoT.

IoT solution providers lead the way

In 2007, I began monitoring corporate initiatives in the IoT industry. In those days, mobile network operators (MNOs) were the predominant actors as the industry sought new markets for growth. The roughly fifty initiatives occurring in 2025 highlight the importance of solution providers. This is a sign of the importance of delivering value by solving everyday business challenges. Solution providers encompass a wide range of organizations, including entities such as AWS IoT, Siemens and Microsoft, and PTC. 

‘Solutions’ map to the upper layers of the IoT stack. Below these are the industry layers that deal with ‘connectivity’ and ‘connected devices.’ Connectivity shows up in the form of MNO, MVNO (virtual), LPNO (low power), and satellite connectivity providers. A continuing development in 2025 is the rapprochement between cellular and satellite industries. This was best expressed by a policy executive who remarked that it was now not uncommon to come across satellite industry representatives in meetings at the GSMA’s offices. 

Underpinning solutions, the coverage aspect of connectivity continues to matter for the industry. A few examples are: Vodafone’s partnership with Mobily to expand the former’s Saudi Arabian footprint; SingTel addressing global IoT deployments by allying with FloLive; and, Verizon adding SingTel and Skylo partnerships for global IoT. 

Working Across the IoT Industry Chain 

Connectivity partnerships – one MNO partnering with another MNO from a different geographic region - are a form of in-segment or horizontal industry initiative. However, effective IoT spans the industry chain because several elements are essential for a complete solution. One way to visualize this is by studying cross-industry connections. For 2025, these amounted to over 60% of the initiatives. Solution Providers, for example, are a good example of cross-segment reach. In addition to standalone solution provider initiatives (4), organizations in this segment partnered with other solution providers (4), MNOs (5), vendors (4), and investors (4). 

Vendors Unlock New Industry Segments 

The third-ranking group in the industry map is vendors. Many of their initiatives focused on connected devices and capability enhancements. Examples include G+D launching a credit card sized IoT tracker for shipping applications and Sequans using the acquisition route to boost its RedCap activities. 

Across the industry, the topic of Edge IoT continues to capture attention. Qualcomm was most consistent in illustrating how this dynamic is playing out. Its corporate initiatives included the acquisition of Edge Impulse with an emphasis on AI and IoT capabilities. Qualcomm then established an AI and IoT engineering center in Abu Dhabi before acquiring Arduino to improve developers’ access to edge computing and AI. 

Governments’ Growing Role in IoT 

With IoT becoming more central to the economy, government will have an increasingly important influence on the market. Three developments illustrate trends for the future. Firstly, European regulators approved a unified framework for non-cellular satellite IoT, overcoming years of patchwork regulation. Middle East regulators are likely to follow. 

In India, there are plans to develop an IoT-ready UPI (universal payments infrastructure) system to automate payment transactions through smart devices and not just phones. This would enable UPI payments through smart devices like TVs, fridges, washing machines, cars, and smart watches, among others. 

Finally, the USA will require U.S. Cyber Trust Mark labeling on all federally procured connected devices after January 4, 2027. The requirement that connected devices meet baseline cybersecurity standards (secure software updates, data protection measures, and vulnerability reporting mechanisms) will have spillover effects into the wider IoT market. 

Promise and Peril 

Towards the year end, Vodafone and 1NCE initiatives drew attention to much greater promise for the IoT came. In the case of Vodafone, its Americas Managing Director, Dennis Nikles, described plans to act on Vodafone’s hyperscaler ambition for IoT. This will involve a shift from scale to hyperscale (a topic I have covered in the past), partnering (in place of competing), and simplification (to cut complexity and costs) as a strategy. 

The second development, addressing the importance of moving beyond ‘connectivity’ as a value proposition came from 1NCE’s launch of its ‘Fixers’ line of business. This aims to expand beyond software and connectivity by leveraging implementation experience from over 27,000 customers. ‘Fixers’ will provide advisory services on building better IoT solutions, driving efficient usage of existing intelligent products, and debugging technical faults. 

With IoT devices and systems becoming more prevalent, value creation opportunities multiply as does the prospect for peril. Two stories illustrate grounds for concern. The first involves French authorities arresting two crew members of a passenger ferry. They are suspected of infecting the ship with malware with the possibility of remotely controlling the vessel. 

In the second story, Andrej Karpathy, a cofounder of OpenAI, experimented to see if Claude Code could get into his home automation system. His prompt led Claude Code to find his Lutron controllers on the local Wi-Fi network (check for open ports, connect, get metadata, and identify devices and their firmware). There followed an Internet search for the PDF for his system and then instructions on what button to press to pair and get necessary certificates. It then connected to the system and found all his home devices (lights, shades, HVAC temperature control, motion sensors etc.). The routine then ran checks by turning his kitchen lights on and off. 

Prospects for 2026 

Industry developments over the course of 2025 point to an evolution in industry mindset, with larger organizations addressing new market and business growth opportunities. These go beyond connections and connectivity as IoT meshes with complementary technologies such as AI, digital twins, data with meaning, and payments. As combinations of these technologies work their way into industry and public infrastructure, there remain questions about how the IoT industry will deal with adversity arising from malicious actors to accidental engineers over-relying on generative AI. There must be sources of opportunity for value added propositions targeting users and infrastructure via data protection, security, and trustworthiness propositions.

 

Cluster Competitiveness in 6G Ecosystems

Finland’s academic, commercial and government connections can inspire other 6G clusters

3GPP’s December 2023 announcement, committing to develop the specifications for 6G, resolved one market uncertainty about 6G. 3GPP offers a proven governance framework for open, consensual and international technical standardization. It is also a globally recognized institution due to its track record and regional standardization partners.

There are, however, other technical and socio-technical aspects of 6G that are likely to alter 3GPP standardization. For example, there will be new frontiers to address as the scope of mobile networks extends to distributed communications and computing systems. In the socio-economic arena too, new expectations are taking shape. These touch on resource sustainability, capabilities to ensure resilience and trust, and socio-technical issues arising from digital world applications that go beyond purely human and machine communications.

Opportunities to Apply AI and ML in IoT Systems

My last article [1] introduced a framework to explain the basic elements of an IoT system with the aim of highlighting where Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML) and Digital Twin (DT) components are typically added. 

The aim of this article is to explore the longer-term opportunities for AI/ML technologies and how these will shape mobile operator and technology provider business strategies. There are two developments to consider in drawing out this roadmap. One is the tighter integration of IoT and AI/ML technologies vertically along the technology stack. Think of this as a way of improving how well different components interact to improve reliability and service quality. The second concerns a new set of requirements that users and regulatory agencies will expect from AI/ML systems. As an illustrative example, consider an AI application that issues an alarm that a machine is about to fail with some probabilistic context such as “greater than 75% chance of failure in the next month”. Is it enough to stop a production line based on this read out? In practice, there is likely to be a higher-level requirement that determines the trustworthiness of this alarm based on its performance over time. Like the boy who cried ‘wolf’, does a sequence of alarms point to a deteriorating piece of equipment or a faulty sensor? The judgement required here involves a different set of data and potentially the involvement of other, supervisory AI/ML sub-systems.

Regulation and Competitive Advantage

A couple of years ago, I was in conversation with a group of technologists and investors at the annual meeting of the Transportation Research Board. This gathering takes place every January in Washington DC. Think of it as the transportation industry's equivalent of Mobile World Congress. 

Our group was discussing the then emerging market for connected cars. I threw in a question about the impact of regulation on their business strategies. Regulation matters in relation to safety, liability and insurance solutions, and data management. Factors such as these matter more to commercial viability than technical innovations. The need to factor regulation into technology choices and business models was evident even then. The universal response I got from the group was that innovators needed to be given the leeway to develop the technology and novel services. Putting it explicitly, regulators needed to stay well out of the way.

The same issues are apparent as new markets develop on top of the foundations of mobile communications. One example is the sharing of consumer data derived from mobile phones [1]. Another is Facebook's difficulties in launching its Libra currency and payments initiative, ahead of regulatory buy-in.

Joined-up thinking for smart cities

What are the more common justifications for smart city investments? Citizen-centred service needs, political priorities and a positive return-on-investment (RoI) would certainly feature in the list of possibilities.

All too often, however, individual smart city initiatives are destined to become orphan investments [1]. These are standalone or siloed solutions. They meet a timing imperative or they are designed in isolation from system-wide factors [2].

The investment case for Smart City data

I recently attended the Smart Cities Connect conference in Kansas, MO. There, I moderated a panel on data marketplaces and collaborative approaches to smart city solutions.

The event demonstrated that there is a growing body of interest in smart city solutions. It also highlighted several themes that should dominate the agenda in coming years. The more interesting topics included collaboration, interoperability and principles of data monetization.

2017 in Review: Making the IoT work

Looking back over notable, M2M/IoT corporate initiatives in 2017, mobile network operators (MNOs) and technology vendors were the two most active groups in the industry eco-system.

The main feature amongst MNOs was market expansion into new geographies. Sometimes, this happened individually; more often, it took the form of partnering with other network operators. This is a classic growth model for the mobile operator community.

In the technology vendor community, leading initiatives took the form of: acquisitions/investments; partnering (with MNOs, platform providers and system integrators); and, product innovation.

In comparative terms, activity among platform organizations was subdued. And, end-users barely featured among 2017 initiatives. It is likely that these last two data points mask a higher level of internal activity targeting operational scaling and in-house developments as firms solidify their foundations in the IoT market. As an example, Altair, a provider of engineering software to enterprise customers, acquired the Carriots IoT platform. This initiative illustrates the trend to internalize IoT capabilities and has parallels with the earlier acquisition of ThingWorx by PTC [1].

IDEAthons – connecting IoT ideas, execution and funding

As new technologies become commonplace, there is a case for exploring new value creation opportunities in the realm of application ideas. Put differently, should the ever-popular hackathon give way to a new type of event – the ideathon? This notion cropped up when I attended my first ever ideathon to explore innovative service and business model opportunities in the IoT and intelligent

transport solutions markets.

The intent of an ideathon is to bring together individuals from different organizations to form small teams that work through new ideas. Teams don’t just focus on technology; they consider factors such as drivers of demand, the value proposition, the service delivery business model and its economics.

The event I attended included a mix of entrepreneurs, public-sector representatives and technologists who were exploring new ideas, building on the oneTRANSPORT regional intelligent transport system trial [1] and the Transport Data Initiative [2].

Will digital transformation save the telco industry?

Over the past few weeks, McKinsey [1] and the World Economic Forum (WEF) [2] have weighed in on the debate about long term growth prospects in the telecommunications sector. They have valid concerns which arise from projections for low revenue growth and shrinking margins for telecommunications service providers. The near term prospects for many telcos involves the sale ever increasing volumes of data and cloud services to consumer and business customers on the assumption that price elasticity effects will work in their favor and not undermine top-line, revenue growth.

The McKinsey and WEF ideas rely on optimizing the core business and building at the periphery to support digital services and enhanced customer experiences. These approaches take a narrow view of the market for telcos and one and define competition in terms of other telco service providers. Is that really the right way to address the strategic challenge that faces the industry?

Industrial IoT Strategy

The combined activities of the Industrial Internet Consortium and Industrie4.0 alliance, culminating in the much expanded IoT Solutions World Congress in October seem to have given significant impetus to IoT adoption in the industrial sector. In several of my discussions over Q4-2016, I witnessed growing evidence that corporate executives have tasked their business development and strategy teams to formulate plans to integrate IoT more closely into their core operations.

The IoT takes most industrial organizations into a new operating domain and requires a process of self-education to begin with. Most of the questions I encountered began around the two topics of connectivity technology choices and approaches to justify the IoT business case.

Comparative advantage in IoT standardization

Last year, I wrote a post about the landscape of standards development organizations, industry-alliances and company consortia [1]. Several recent developments have led me to revisit the topic. There are signs that the IoT market is maturing. Users and service providers are well beyond the first hurdle of understanding a new capability and set of enabling technologies. And, businesses are exploring the longer-term road map for IoT solutions and the underlying enablers they will need.

Nigel Upton, Worldwide Director and GM IoT/GCP at Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HP-E) encapsulated the issue, from a business standpoint, in a recent conference presentation [2]. He advised companies that they could simplify their IoT strategies by using a common platform, a common data model and an IoT standard. It so happens that HP-E chose oneM2M, viewing it as the best supported standard on offer.

IoT alliances and interoperability

I have recently been consulting on the topic of IoT Platform strategy with a particular focus on the recently issued oneM2M standard. As part of this work, I researched the activities of different IoT alliances and industry groups because there is a lot of industry discussion about competing standards.

In discussions with company executives, a recurring theme is that nobody wants to take a bet on any single ‘standards’ approach. As a result, many companies choose to hedge their bets and participate in multiple initiatives. Having examined several of the leading initiatives from different dimensions, it’s debatable whether companies are getting a strategic, product-development return on their participation (setting aside brand-building and corporate networking benefits).

There are many different ways to look at each of initiatives. For this post, let’s begin by concentrating on their mission and primary objectives.

2014 Corporate Initiatives; market rules are changing

Following several years of rapid growth, the 141 corporate initiatives in 2014 almost matched the 147 events that occurred in 2013.

In 2014, companies in the M2M eco-system were less active in several areas. As illustrated below, there were fewer recorded events of companies either: expanding into new market segments; promoting new technology; and, entering into partnering agreements. Product innovation saw a rise in activity as companies launched new products and services. In general, these addressed the needs for specific customer applications.

Business innovation at IoT speed

Having worked on the topic of M2M value chain structures in 2012, a couple of relevant market developments caught my attention over the past few weeks. These involve: Aeris, an M2M service provider, Cisco, and Deutsche Telekom.

Each of these company initiatives aims to simplify the process of implementing M2M and IoT applications. They provide guidance to (non-technical) companies that are seeking to implement M2M solutions while also providing an organising structure for complex application situations. These examples hold lessons that companies can apply to improve their sales performance in M2M and IoT markets.

Pricing M2M to drive sales revenues

Over the past few years, technology suppliers and service providers have become increasingly optimistic about the market prospects for M2M. Much of this is attributable to the promise of multi-billion unit sales as yesteryear’s M2M sector is absorbed into today’s, broader IoT classification.

M2M has broken out of its historical, niche thanks to a shared industry vision to evangelize the M2M opportunity. Return-on-Investment (RoI) arguments for M2M applications have no doubt been persuasive in fostering the adoption of new applications. However, two other developments have arguably had a greater influence over adoption and RoI outcomes. One is the introduction of simpler, standard operational procedures tailored to M2M (e.g. life-cycle provisioning). The second is the year-on-year reduction in hardware and connectivity costs which have resulted in lower prices to customers.

There is a risk however that these developments and the price-led strategy, in particular, will pose a longer term threat to existing M2M business strategies.

Managing M2M inside an MNO

France’s Orange has a long history in the M2M market and was one of the early pioneers in establishing an M2M competence centre, leveraging the deep expertise of its M2M team, notably in the Belgian market. It was therefore interesting to see Orange Business Services’ announcement of a strategic partnership to use Ericsson’s Device Connection Platform (DCP).

Orange has operating companies in several different countries and is also a partner with Deutsche Telekom in the UK’s Everything Everywhere. Orange is separately a partner with Deutsche Telekom, TeliaSonera and Telecom Italia in the Global M2M Association. In light of these different constituents, one interpretation of the Orange/Ericsson partnership is as a neutral platform that many, if not all, of the M2M operating businesses can buy into.

If this is indeed the strategy, it would shift the responsibility for coordinating multiple platforms, capabilities and expertise onto Ericsson. Channel and account management responsibilities would then more naturally fall on to individual operating businesses.

To get a sense of the coordination challenges and operational complexities that arises in enterprise-grade and multi-platform environments, it is instructive to look at another company, Telefónica.

Smart Home Platform Innovator Strategies

Early in 2012, I completed a study for the GSM Association (GSMA) on the topic of new business models that would be linked to innovative, connected-device applications. This study laid out a sequence of value propositions, as companies seek to move up the value chain. In order to bring these new value propositions to market, new and innovative business models would need to be designed.

In the early days of M2M, the value proposition was all about connectivity. This would make stand-alone devices ‘smart’ and the business challenge was largely about how connectivity could be ‘embedded’ inexpensively. Later on, the market evolved as companies started to care about deployment, reliability and the user-experience issues. This ushered in a new value proposition around managed connectivity and several specialist platform providers have emerged in their own right or as partners to mobile operators.

The final two sources of value that were identified included the delivery of ‘platform innovator’ and ‘stewardship’ services. The connected devices market has been moving in these directions with three companies – Arrayent, Deutsche Telekom’s Qivicon and Zonoff – investing their energies in the platforms arena.

M2M Acquisitions and the Price of Growth

The topic of acquisitions in the M2M market has featured in several company announcements and several of my discussions with industry players. In late June Avista Capital Partners completed its $253m acquisition of Telular Corporation, an M2M event monitoring and reporting service provider.

During the month of May, the CEO of Sierra Wireless was quizzed about his company’s acquisition intentions by financial analysts at a Global TMT Conference organised by Jefferies, an investment bank. Following its divestiture of a non-core business unit to focus on M2M, Sierra Wireless holds about $160m on its balance sheet. Of this, about $100m is being earmarked for M&A initiatives. So, what are some of the considerations that will determine how these funds might be deployed?

M2M Corporate Initatives - Strong H1-2013

Over the first half of 2013, there has been strong evidence that companies in the M2M market are continuing to implement a range of business strategies to capture new M2M service and revenue opportunities. Specifically:

• the number of corporate initiatives is more than double that for the corresponding period in 2012

• the market is no longer entirely driven by supply-side companies; several enterprises have strategically embraced M2M connectivity and have either partnered with mobile network operators or they are taking the lead role in developing new services

Prices and Value of Consumer Data

The topic of personal data has interested me for a number of years because it is at the heart of new approaches to marketing and service development based on connected devices. I have written about the commercial potential of personal data from a business model perspective [1] for the GSM Association and introduced the concept of Stewardship and Platform Innovator strategies for companies in the mobile eco-system.

I was therefore pleased to see the Financial Times (FT) publish a series of articles on consumer data. Accompanying this series is an interactive calculator [2] that allows readers to determine a price for their personal data based on pricing benchmarks supplied by a data broker. After filling in the options for my own profile - in terms of demographics, family and health, property, activities of interest, and consumer behaviors - it appears that the price for my personal profile is about US$0.80.