Evaluating and Choosing an IoT Platform

Chapter 1. Evaluating and Choosing an IoT Platform

1. Is an IoT Platform Necessary?

As the Internet of Things (IoT) continues to saturate the world of business and consumer-facing applications, it is all too easy for rational decisions about its adoption to be complicated by the latest bells, whistles, and trends. Every business is determined to be current, or even better, aligned with the future of its industry ecosystem. Over the past decade, purveyors of Internet connectivity, the “plumbing” that welds together existing layers of a business (and thereby creates new layers) have described this future in glowing terms. Every year, millions more devices and things will become “smart,” with individual IP addresses that enable the transmission and receipt of data.

The IoT promises to transform how we do business and even the very nature of that business. The challenge today is to know where to begin. Should IoT be phased in, adopted in increments, or is it necessary for companies to invest in the most sophisticated and complete IoT platforms as soon as possible?

Opinion is heavily divided, and as with any new technology, there is as much hype to cut through as there is hard information to harness. Estimates for the expansion of IoT technology vary widely—billions of connected devices, trillions in market sales—but how does this apply to day-to-day operations?

The imperative to modernize applies to almost all businesses that feel the heat from competition and the pull of research ...