Internet of Things (IoT) is a disruptive technology that is taking a leading role in digital transformation and is influencing the daily life, business environment, and global economy. IoT is a computing concept that explains the connection of physical devices to the Internet and their ability to communicate with other devices. From a management perspective, the goal of implementing IoT is to digitalize the traditional product-oriented enterprises towards a data-driven one in order to add value to products or services offered. The application of IoT has impacted several application domains and is often classified into two categories: customer IoT and industrial IoT.
Customer IoT
Customer IoT includes common devices used by the end-user and it is the collecting of personal information from the user in any place and building intelligent applications on top of these data that are adapted to the user needs and dynamics of the environment. An example of that would be the envision of ubiquitous healthcare to offer better healthcare through a patient-centric solution enabled by the Internet of Things using body area sensors to continuously monitor and collect data to identify diseases. Furthermore, the control of home applications such as refrigerators, washing & dryer machines, air conditioners from a central control point through an IoT enabled wireless solution will allow for a better home and energy management. However, that adoption of the smart home is slower than expected because they are both technically and socially disruptive and their usage can be limited from the adaptation and familiarization from householders, and lack of support available for learning how to use smart home technologies.
Industry IOT
Industry IoT is a collection of data from enterprise networks and intelligent based applications to benefit from the transformation of industries. The application of smart urban environment offers many effects on citizens including energy resource management, drinking water quality assurance, land irrigation monitoring, smart transformation systems, and efficient logistics management among others. IoT can be applied in utilities to retrieve information from the network to enhance service optimization, but at the same time, it offers the potential for patient-centric solution for efficient energy resource management through the installation of smart grids to reduce energy loss and smart meters to better coordinate energy demand and supply. Furthermore, IoT can be applied for quality assurance of drinking water as sensors can be installed to ensure high supply quality and to monitor irrigation of agricultural land as an information network to monitor soil parameters will allow for better data-based agricultural decisions.
Industry IoT is a collection of data from enterprise networks and intelligent based applications to benefit from the transformation of industries.
In addition, mobile IoT applications can be built by the data collected from mobile nodes and a typical representative of such application is a smart transformation system. Traffic congestion imposes significant costs on supply chain efficiencies and productivity, especially with the just-in-time operations because of cargo delays and delivery failures. The transport IoT can replace the existing traffic information sensor networks with a video-based surveillance system to provide real-time relevant information about traffic congestion and to detect traffic behaviors in order to provide intelligent route guidance and accident warnings. Another application of the IoT mobile domain is effective logistic management that includes item monitoring and transportation planning. Efficient transport planning through a large network of IoT can provide many benefits for logistics providers such as reduced delivery expenses by avoiding congested sections and improve the service quality by delivering goods within the time-frame required.
The new business opportunities of the Internet of Things are that enterprises can improve their productivity, lower operating expenses, and enhance the customer service experience. We work with brands in the adoption of IoT to increase productivity by providing real-time information and to improve the customer journey in enhancing proactive shopper experience in retail.
