A survey in the US has found that while IoT is already widespread and growing, it’s still more popular with companies specialising in technology.
Conducted by Techanalysis Research last month, it reached out to 620 professionals working for companies involved in the area of IoT.
Half of the respondents were from medium-sized businesses with between 100-900 employees, and the other came from larger firms of over 1000 staff.
Operations teams leading IoT projects
The report found that operations departments tend to lead and be responsible for IoT-related projects, with IT teams playing a more second nature role with regards to management.
As well as this, companies looking to benefit from IoT are most interested in applications such as employee monitoring, security and identification, and energy savings.
Organisations are also more concerned with improving processes than saving money. If they are looking to save financial resources, the top saving areas are around more efficient operations, monthly utilities and employee time.
Companies want IoT for themselves
Another interesting finding is the fact that half of companies expect to purchase and own all aspects of their IoT in the near future. Top purchases include endpoints, network and onsite analytics software.
At this stage, many of the companies seem to be developing their IoT offering rather than in full deployment. According to the survey, they’re still in the testing and proof-of-concept stages.
Although companies recognise that the Internet of Things is set to boom over the next few years, purchases still need to be approved by high-level processes. As expected, this can slow the rate of deployment.
You might like to read: How to get C-level execs to back your Internet of Things project
No one-way, one-size solution
Klaus Gheri, VP & GM Network Security at Barracuda Networks, believes that the biggest obstacle for companies adopting IoT is the fact there’s not a one-way solution.
He told Internet of Business: “The biggest challenge of the IoT is that there’s not a ‘one size fits all’ solution. On one end of the spectrum, we’re talking about tiny equipment such as wearables and intelligent lightbulb.
“On the other, we’re talking about big machine equipment. Depending on what the IoT device is, there will be a different approach to roll-out, maintenance and security that is economically viable for each business.”
Data holds value but is challenging
Patrick McFadin, chief evangelist for Apache Cassandra at DataStax, sees lots of value for businesses centred around data. However, he says this in itself can be a challenge.
He told IoB: “The value comes from analysing this data, enriching it and then using the results of this analysis in real time alongside any future transactions that take place.
“The key challenge for IoT is to bring all these different systems together. Data sets like graph data and time-series data have great potential value for analytics, while the analysis of actions should take place in as near real-time as possible in order to create more value for the business. This approach means bringing together different database management systems into one overall approach.”
You might like to read: What’s stopping you from adopting the Internet of Things?