IoT data without action dies!

How many times have we been told that IoT is the future of business? A lot I would hazard a guess which is why 80% of senior executives now say that IoT data is critical to their business in 2020 and 92% of organisations are expecting to adopt some form of IoT by the end of 2019….and it is nearly Christmas. 2 years ago, we heard that there would be 20 Billion connected devices by 2020 but I suspect we are already there.

Given all that, where is the productivity boom that we have been promised? You can’t watch the news, flick through your social media feeds or listen to any politician without hearing about the continuing mystery of lack of productivity growth. Is it due to lack of investment, lack of skills, relatively cheap labour? Or are we simply not optimising our investments.

Less than 1% of the data sensors capture is used.

Stats fans, of those 20 billions (or so) connected devices, less than 1% of the data being captured is used. Is it therefore such a surprise that 97% of organisations that are investing in IoT say they have challenges generating value from their investments?

Every time I go back to that “less than 1%” statistic, I find it increasingly unbelievable but although the original source is not 100% clear (it is variously attributed to Harvard Business Review – blogged by Cisco, McKinsey and Gartner to name a few – perhaps they have all come to the same conclusion), it is widely discussed and accepted. Why would you buy a car, put new tyres on it, fill it with fuel but then not install the Sat Nav to take you to where you need to get to efficiently? Lets get the map out of the glove box and pull over every 20 minutes to check it or employ someone to sit next to you reading the map….

Lots of sensors, lots of data, next… lots of action.

IoT is smart tech but at its heart, it is really simple. A sensor in a particular location gives you a piece of information you would not normally have without being there. The logical step is to take note and take action. There are fundamentally 3 actions you can take:

1. All is fine – do nothing.
2. All may not be fine – check other sources of data, if all is fine, see option 1 or if not.
3. Take action.

The hard bit comes when you have those 20 billion devices all talking to you at once. The decisions, although still at a basic level the same, very quickly become beyond the capabilities of a single human (or for that matter, many many humans).

However, cloud computing and smart workflow systems can make this happen. Simply displaying this information in maps and graphs (although useful) is not enough. The action gets lost in the noise and the value of your investment goes the same way.

IoT data without action dies….let technology take the wheel.