Every year, Strategy Analytics puts together list of likely predictions that will shape the year ahead in the Internet of Things (IoT). 2014 saw the industry move away from the term M2M and towards a more open and obsessively hyped term, the Internet of Things or IoT. While smartphones and tablets have stolen the limelight in recent years they are also now taking a back seat, or rather providing an access point for, a new wave of connectivity. With the Internet of Things now in the vanguard, the world of connecting objects to people as well as other objects is progressing faster than it ever has in the past.

Despite the multitude of definitions, IoT is most easily understood as optimizing an ecosystem, rather than a process, which most readily defined the M2M market. In IoT, there will be a shift to connected systems of systems, which may occupy the same ecosystem or entirely separate ecosystems e.g. social network data from Twitter, combined with industrial traffic system to create a new service of traffic alerts. This may combine any number of protocols and standards, that when combined, produce new systems of systems that enable the creation of new services.

The landscape will continue to shift in 2015 as the world moves increasingly towards IoT, ushering a new era of open source platforms that will challenge existing M2M platforms. M&A will continue as vendors increasingly look to strengthen their capabilities in big data analytics and architecture will see more emphasis on the edge of the network, as more processing is undertaken locally in a geo-distributed manner rather than purely in the cloud. IoT will become more personal, as users become on and contributors to, the Internet of Things.

1.  In 2015 new, open and scalable connectivity platforms will emerge to challenge the incumbent M2M platform vendors.  
2.  In 2015, M&A activity will continue unabated in many areas such as connectivity, software, especially analytics, and also consolidation among platform vendors, with the number now available growing rapidly.
3. In 2015, the smartphone as a hub moves into a central position in IoT, both as a node and BAN (Body Area Network) hub for users, fundamental in all manner of mashups, from raw data via sensors, to information produced for social networks that will play into the broader IoT ecosystem.
4. 2015 will be all about “apps” for IoT, which will see much more engagement of users with IoT applications, but the longer term picture will see mashups with social media as well as the move to a more integrated, open, physical web that also seamlessly includes contextual interaction with local area technologies such as BLE and Beacons and that do not require apps for access.
5. In 2015 there will be progression in the development of physical web specifications and context-based developments in IoT. Combining real-time contextual information from users, with user information from big data repositories, will enable a whole new suite of services for end users that are more tailored to specific needs and tasks, from special offers in retail contexts to bus or train timetable information managed in real time and personalized.
6. In 2015 we will see more of a shift to decentralized architectures and edge networking in IoT where data is created from geographically distributed devices, we will see decentralization of data storage, processing and analytics – there is just not enough network bandwidth in the future to transfer all the data in real-time.
7. In 2015, organizations looking to implement an IoT strategy will see an increased need for real-time data processing. Real time data processing and analytics allows an organization the ability to take immediate action for those times when acting within seconds or minutes is significant. The goal is to obtain the insight required to act prudently at the right time, which increasingly means immediately.
8. In 2015, the larger enterprise software, integrators and consulting companies will increasingly play a major role in helping companies take next steps with M2M and IoT. Traditionally, service providers have been major players here, but with the growth in big data and analytics, the tide is shifting towards existing IT providers to provide direction in future.
9. In 2015 the subject of data privacy will emerge in discussions around IoT, as the question of who owns the data becomes a central discussion point.
10. In 2015, any organization contemplating a move to IoT must carefully and proactively map out a security strategy and strictly adhere to it. Businesses should also work with their chosen IoT vendors in advance to:

• Ensure that they have theproper certification and
• Test, test & re-test prior to deployment
• Cost out in advance how much a security attack could cost their firm in terms of actual monies, lost revenue, remediation of data and network assets. Also factor in damage to the company’s reputation and the heightened risk of litigation.

What do you think of our list and what do you think will be the key IoT topics in 2015?

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