2019 in Review: A changed IoT landscape

The turn of the year has triggered many people to reflect on what they were doing 10 years ago. With that in mind, I looked through my tracker of M2M and IoT corporate initiatives to see what has changed and what we might learn about the future. The main categories of initiative include the following: technology innovation, market entry/expansion, partnering, acquisitions/investments, distributor agreements, product/service innovation, business reorganization and outsourcing.

A more tightly knit IoT value-chain 

A snapshot of the 2009 industry covers a relatively well defined mobile-industry ecosystem. This largely centered on mobile operator initiatives, driven by leading operators and supported by GSMA efforts to develop a new market for the mobile ecosystem.

Privacy payoffs in smart cities

A few weeks ago, I spoke at the Connected Cities Privacy Summit (CCPS) in Washington DC. This was a 'first of a kind' event focusing on data privacy issues. Other smart city events tend to feature pilot-projects and technology demonstrators.CCPS drew speakers from Google’s Sidewalk Labs and public-sector officials from Canada. US presenters came from a range of academic, consultancy, legal and technology organizations [1].

Many of the CCPS presentations took a cautious approach to privacy protections. To some extent, this reflected the nature of the audience. Roughly half of the attendees hailed from legal, compliance and policy professions. I took a somewhat different approach. My presentation covered the opportunities arising from data sharing. This drew on some of the lessons learned from oneTRANSPORT.io, one of my consulting projects over the past few years [2].

Telcos and Smart Cities

Earlier this month, the publications team from Mobile Europe hosted their Smart IoT Connect event in London [1]. This is one in a regular series that examines the role of the telecoms ecosystem against

a backdrop of opportunities across the Internet of Things (IoT) industry. I was fortunate to attend and here are a few highlights from this year’s event which focused on the smart cities sector.

In broad terms, the supply-side of the industry is maturing. Businesses are focusing on the practicalities of closing commercial deals in contrast to launching exploratory pilot projects. There is a realization that the smart city proposition and sales process spans a wider set of parameters than telco connectivity. Telcos are talking about new commercial models and service solutions, such as data management, that map to higher levels of the IoT solutions stack and above the connectivity layer. However, based on what was presented it is going to take time to translate strategy into execution, at scale, and commercial success. The number of local government representatives attending the event reflected positively on the demand side of the equation. It validates a key theme throughout the event about the need to bridge the public-sector-to-telco knowledge gap.

MNOs’ IoT Platform Predicament

IoT Analytics, the German market research firm, recently published a customer satisfaction assessment of IoT platforms [1]. It covers 50 vendors and applies a broad definition for IoT platforms. At one end of the spectrum, there are multi-purpose cloud infrastructure and platforms, such as those offered by Amazon and Microsoft. At the other end are platforms for niche users, with machine builders as one example.

IoT Analytics used feedback from senior executives in organizations that procured and are deploying IoT solutions to rate the top-25 platforms. There is a slight bias to North America, which accounted for 40% of the mix. Europe (25%), APAC (25%) and MEA (10%) make up the rest of the survey.

For this post, I propose to focus on a summary chart. This maps leaders, challengers and follower IoT platforms across technology and customer-centricity dimensions. The chart highlights a predicament for mobile network operators and especially the large European operators.

Mobile IoT and Adjacent Industries

How time flies! Over 10 years ago, I was part of a GSMA strategy team that looked at new growth markets for the mobile industry. Our report – entitled ‘Embedded Mobile: M2M and Beyond’ – identified opportunities for growth in adjacent industries. This would need the GSMA to promote the collective interests of the mobile industry in several ways. One recommendation was to work with supply-side partners. This would lower the barriers to adoption of mobile in non-mobile industries.

A second recommendation focused on stimulating demand by fostering a dialog with non-mobile industries. Besides highlighting the value of connecting assets, it would provide a channel to feed user needs back into the mobile eco-system.

In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crash, the GSMA’s initiative survived and thrived. Soon, senior executives from the automotive and pharmaceuticals sectors became keynote speakers at Mobile World Congress (MWC). And, the composition of MWC attendees changed with an influx from non-mobile industry sectors.

Why does this history matter now?

Looking up the IoT Value Chain

People are so preoccupied with everyday tasks that they often miss out on what is around them.

Walking down the street, how often do you catch people looking up at the features of old buildings or roof-level signage? The same is true in business life. Let’s consider how this plays out in the IoT market.

Recently, I heard a telco executive explain why mobile network operators (MNOs) focus on connectivity. He pointed to two factors. One is that connections and data connectivity are straightforward things to measure, with a well-established legacy from mobile phone sales. In effect, businesses manage what they can measure. The second is that it is easy to look down at the network from the MNO’s vantage point in the IoT technology stack. It takes an effort to lift one’s head and look up. That’s much like missing out on the architectural features and art work when we walk head-down (even without the excuse of a smartphone) along a street.

Occasionally, however, it makes sense to look up, not just to appreciate your surroundings but also to get a sense of whether the world is changing and how you might need to adapt.

Rumelt on 3G: Lessons for 5G and IoT

The consultancy McKinsey recently republished a 2007 interview with Richard Rumelt [1], professor of strategy at UCLA’s Anderson School of Management. Rumelt opened his commentary on strategy by noting that most corporate strategic plans have little to do with strategy. Instead, they typically end up being “three-year or five-year rolling resource budgets and some sort of market share projection”.

What senior managers want out of the strategy process, according to Rumelt, is a pathway to substantially higher performance. That can happen in one of two ways. A firm can either invent its way to success or, it can quickly and skillfully exploit some change in the environment. Examples of such change include technology, consumer taste, resource price or competitive behavior factors.

The telecoms industry finds itself at the intersection of many such changes. On the supply side, the arrival of 5G networks and the standardization of low-power IoT devices provide two industry transition opportunities. These developments will usher in new service concepts and business opportunities.