Companies optimistic over IoT's potential

Organisations have high hopes for the Internet of Things (IoT), but few have established clear business or technical leadership for their IoT efforts, according to Gartner.

A survey of 463 IT and business leaders, including 15% from mature APAC markets such as Australia, shows that 60% expect the IoT to generate significant new revenue or cost-saving opportunities.

Furthermore, around 40% of respondents expect these new opportunities to be presented over the next three years.

But less than a quarter of survey respondents said that their organisations have established clear business or technical IoT leadership. This proportion rises to 35% among companies expecting IoT to have a significant or transformational impact on their business.

Capitalising on the IoT requires either a single leader for IoT efforts or multiple leaders from different business units, Gartner said.

“The survey confirmed that the IoT is very immature, and many organisations have only just started experimenting with it,” Gartner VP Nick Jones commented. “Only a small minority have deployed solutions in a production environment.”

The costs of networking and processors have fallen to the extent that it is now economically viable to add sensing and communications to products costing as little as a few tens of dollars, he said.

“The real challenge of the IoT is less in making products ‘smart’ and more in understanding the business opportunities enabled by smart products and new ecosystems.”

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