Welcome to the IoT graveyard

As the New Year approaches and the Internet begins celebrating a rosy future for IIoT markets in 2017, let us not forget the companies and products that we buried in 2016.

IoT platforms connect things to the cloud, breaking down data silos and democratizating data analytics. While potential applications appear virtually endless, near term profitability remains elusive for many companies. 2016 added platform providers such as Fogger (the 66th of >1,400 vendors to list on IoT ONE), viBrain Solutions and Zegg to the IoT graveyard. Sensor and device innovators were not spared. Promising companies such as BluePan and Deconstruction were unable to scale rapidly enough to appease investors. 

The founder of Lumos, a defunct IoT startup, elaborated on their company's death by Dunning-Kruger effect. The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias whereby unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority due to lack of experience, mistakenly assessing their ability to be much higher than is accurate. It is a virtual epidemic among IoT startups. 

Innovation is a cruel business. In the words of Jeff Thermond, Venture Partner at XSeed Capital, "The emergence of Next Big Things seems to be a long lived fact of life, and so they are a constant danger to aspiring entrepreneurs." 

We wish all IoT entrepreneurs a sober and steady 2017.

Testbeds: Speed dating for Industrial IoT

To help organisations gain real-world experience and prove out complex IIoT systems, the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) operates a rigorous testbed program which helps to generate requirements and priorities for standards organisations.

Scott Hibbard, VP of Technology at Bosch, has joked that "It's kind of like speed dating", adding that the experience has been more positive that past blind dates. Bosch is involved is several of the IIC's testbeds include the Track and Trace Testbed featured below. Testbeds range in focus from developing core technologies to developing a Smart Factory Web to enable the 'factory-as-a-service' by dynamically linking factories across multiple companies.

If your company is ready to step up to bat in 2017 get in touch and I'll introduce you to the right people at the IIC to discuss if your technology or insight is testbed worthy. 

Big Data 2017: "The King is dead! Long live the King!"

'Tis the season for a biblical flood of New Year Predictions. I wouldn't suggest basing your strategy on them but the exercise yields interesting insights into share of mind in technology markets. 

2016 saw the evolution of interest in Big Data interest from hype to widespread adoption (or claim of adoption). According to Big Data Analytics, high tech organisations led adoption in 2016 with 59% of companies reporting current use. Telecommunications came in next at a 50% adoption rate. According to news out of the Valley, use of Big Data will be a virtual necessity for startups hoping to raise venture capital in 2017. 

If 2017 predictions are an indication, deep learning and in-memory analytics will used to solve business problems in a growing range of niches. Google IBM and others have developed platforms that rent deep learning capabilities, enabling innovators to create powerful yet affordable solutions around pattern recognition. Why is this important? Because most companies, including most multinationals, lack the resources or expertise to build these platforms themselves. 

What about General AI? Word on the grapevine is that General AI's birth was celebrated 10 years too early in 2016. Businesses (and investors) were widely dissatisfied the gap between results and expectations. James Petter, VP of Pure Storage, observed while data acquisition has grown in line with expectations, few companies have been able to "access usable information fast enough to make a difference." Look for companies to refocus on practical niche applications of deep learning, such as visual recognition of cancerous tumors. 

In the chart below, Barc Research identified trending concepts related to data management and analytics. 

Join us in accelerating adoption of the Industrial Internet of Things. If you're an IoT hardware, software, or service provider you can list your company for free and join the IoT ONE ecosystem.

Erik Walenza

@IotOneHQ | [email protected]

P.S. This is an excerpt from the IoT ONE newsletter. You can subscribe HERE.