Unquestionably the biggest revolution of the Internet era, IoT has taken the world by storm connecting machines and people in an efficient web of communication. In India too, the phenomenon is gaining momentum with Government Initiatives and Enterprise adoption, opening up a box of possibilities, leading the way to India’s digital transformation.
“IoT can revolutionize Industries by facilitating new business models, improving efficiency, generating new forms of revenue and save costs.”
George Chacko
Principal Systems Engineer &
Lead Technical Consultant
Brocade India
The Internet of Things phenomenon has taken the entire world by storm. Perhaps the most disruptive technological phenomenon of recent times, Internet of Things is fast influencing businesses and consumers all over the globe. With the proliferation of wireless and connected devices all over the world, the application of IoT can be seen in a variety of verticals ranging from connected sensors to continuous monitoring systems.
“With IoT, industries will become interconnected and data will be used across businesses and industries, fueling innovation.”
Ashish Gulati
Country Head
Telit India
To define, the Internet of Things (IoT) is a system of interrelated computing devices, mechanical and digital machines, objects, animals or people that are provided with unique identifiers and the ability to transfer data over a network without requiring human-to-human or human-to-computer interaction. It is one of the most exciting concepts of the Information era, bringing with it a pool of opportunities. Replacing unbeneficial, tedious human tasking around a computing framework leads to faster operations, better accuracy and eradication of human error, leading to a more efficiently run business.
“Major triggers for this phenomenon (IoT) are the dropping prices of sensors, processing power, and networking bandwidth.”
K Nageswara Rao
Vice President
India Technology Center
Unisys
IoT applications, solutions and products have already found implementation in sectors like manufacturing, transportation, logistics, healthcare, governance and retail. In India too, IoT has taken the front seat across sectors, with both government and private organizations streamlining their operations with a view to better efficiency and accuracy. There are projections that IoT in India will be a 15 billion dollar industry in the next five years, and as wireless connectivity and digitization transforms India into its digital successor, the scope is getting wider and wider.
IoT: An Ocean of Opportunities
According to a recent NASSCOM study, the global opportunity brought about by IoT is likely to touch USD 300 billion by 2020 and in comparison, India would boast of a USD 15 billion market. Indian government released its first IoT framework in 2014 that aims to create a huge IoT market by 2020, impacting the growth of connected devices from the current 200 million to 2.7 billion by 2020.
Sectors like manufacturing, logistics, aviation and healthcare have already started installing smart solutions with sensors and monitoring systems. The government’s digital initiatives have also added to the impetus. Andy Stevenson, Head of Middle East and India, Managing Director for India, Fujitsu believes, “India’s continuous investment of time, energy, and money in Digital India initiative resonates with IoT’s importance in the scheme of things. With Maharashtra government announcing the commissioning of 34 cyber laboratories in the state to deal with the rising menace of cybercrime, stands proof to the fact that India recognizes the massive potential of IoT, and is taking necessary measures to facilitate the same. IoT will successfully empower the rural Indians, and connect them to the urban society seamlessly.”
“For manufacturing companies and municipal governments, IoT has great potential to streamline processes and making our companies and cities efficient.”
Dr. Sumit D Chowdhury
CEO and Founder
Gaia Smart Cities
George Chacko, Principal Systems Engineer & Lead Technical Consultant, Brocade India elaborates on IoT implementation thus far, “Many verticals such as manufacturing, automotive, IT/ITeS, consumer, healthcare already have presence in the entire IoT scheme of things. Indian Government’s focus on developing smart cities and e-governance will further boost the growth of IoT in India. With growth and consolidation, logistics companies would be looking to better leverage technology to drive efficiency in operations. IoT applications for the manufacturing sector whether it is automation or supply chain management would be a key growth area in India. The manufacturers can remotely monitor the condition of equipment and look for indicators of imminent failure – for example vibration, temperature, or pressure outside normal limits which will result in fewer visits, reducing costs and freeing up employees.” Sai Pratyush, Product Head, Managed Services, Enterprise Business – Tata Teleservices believes that once enterprises cross the initial hurdles, the adoption will grow, “IoT is seeing success in Utilities, Logistics, Transport and Retail in India. Despite widespread awareness, large scale adoption and implementation of IoT is still a challenge primarily because organizations are still struggling with the IoT ecosystem and more importantly, the Business Case to justify IoT investments.”
“IoT can help automate solutions to problems in agriculture, health services, energy, security and disaster management through remotely connected devices.”
Vivekanand Venugopal
VP and GM
Hitachi Data Systems India
K Nageswara Rao, Vice President, India Technology Center, Unisys gives a brief on why IoT has suddenly shifted into top gear, “With smart appliances and devices, consumers are witnessing an extension of the internet beyond desktops and mobile devices. Major triggers for this phenomenon are the dropping prices of sensors, processing power, and networking bandwidth. In India, as government initiatives on smart cities gain momentum, IoT opportunities are increasing. And in the agriculture sector many companies are working on fighting climate change using IoT and Big Data through the collection and processing of data on wind, temperature, and climate. I believe environment monitoring (agriculture), urban infrastructure (smart buildings, traffic monitoring, and management), industrial & asset tracking, healthcare (3D printing, fitness and preventive), and consumer electronics (personal safety, entertainment) will emerge as top areas in industrial scale for IoT in India.”
“Organizations are still struggling with the IoT ecosystem and more importantly, the Business Case to justify IoT investments.”
Sai Pratyush
Product Head
Managed Services
Enterprise Business
Tata Teleservices
Buzz among Enterprises
IoT as a phenomenon has the potential to make businesses more efficient than ever before. Ashish Gulati, Country Head, Telit India opines, “With new IoT products under development or recently launched—ranging from medical-monitoring systems to sensors for cars—and it is believed that the IoT will be poised for even greater gains. With IoT industries will become interconnected. Data will be used across businesses and industries, fueling innovation. As an enabler of IoT solutions, we see growth in India coming from Telecom, Energy and Automotive Telematics sectors. Another area where IoT will see a major uptake around the Smarty City projects across India. IoT will challenge companies to be innovative in the same way as mobile internet did.”
“While IoT is expanding the limits of technology beyond our imagination, it is also opening up greater avenues for cybercriminals.”
Andy Stevenson
Head of Middle East and India
Managing Director for India
Fujitsu
RV Raghu, International Director at ISACA believes, “IoT takes us to the next logical set in the progression of or coming together of technology, connectivity, content, data, and computational ability. We have sensors and other devices that are being used to monitor or collect or record various data e.g. weather data, traffic density, and temperature. Increasingly devices are being used to collect various data about humans be it health data or consumption data.” While IoT in enterprises is not a new phenomenon, its adoption in SMEs is. “IoT in the enterprise space has been around for a long time in the Process Automation Control industry and has only recently started gaining traction in other industries as well. It’s clear that India is now going digital and large enterprises have so far led the adoption of digital solutions. However, what excites us the most is the fact that in the last year or so, the adoption of digital solutions in the SME space has also seen a significant increase and that’s a great sign for the industry,” says Sai Pratyush of Tata Teleservices.
“IoT takes us to the next logical set in the progression of technology, connectivity, content, data, and computational ability.”
R.V. Raghu
International Director
ISACA
Dr. Sumit D Chowdhury, CEO & Founder of Gaia Smart Cities adds, “IoT has the potential to enhance the life of existing machinery and improve efficiency by reducing downtime, improving accuracy, reducing manual intervention, creating opportunity for remote monitoring of critical infrastructure. Analyzing trends of these sources of data is giving Industries significant insight into the otherwise manual and guy-feel based management techniques. Enterprises are embedding technology into the buildings and making them smart.”
How IoT is Transforming Businesses
IoT takes enterprise and business connectivity to the next level. It makes way for new approaches, give enterprises leverage and opens new scope of revenue generation, “The internet of things enables to unleash massive amounts of data, and opportunities for the improvement of cities, industries, and energy operations – as well as helps improve daily lives. Prime examples include Uber’s disruption of transportation, Airbnb’s disruption of the travel industry, and numerous digital technologies such as artificial intelligence, automation and robotics transforming the manufacturing industry. Likewise new business models such as trains-as-a-service will enable to reduce the risk that comes from the predictability provided by analytics,” opines Vivekanand Venugopal, VP and GM, Hitachi Data Systems, India.
IoT is revolutionizing businesses every day, George Chacko from Brocade added, “IoT based solutions were the frontrunner among these innovations and the year witnessed IoT implementations in myriad sectors. The value of IoT lies in enriching data collected from devices with analytics and exposing it to applications that enable organizations to derive business value. IoT can revolutionize Industries by enabling digital transformation of businesses, facilitating new business models, improving efficiency, generating new forms of revenue and save costs.”
Digital India and Smart Cities
Proliferation of connected devices and campaigns like Digital India and Make in India have put consumer IoT on the front foot. Gaia Smart Cities’ Dr. Chowdhury believes, “For manufacturing companies and municipal governments who are doing it for the first time, IoT has great potential to streamline processes and making our companies and cities efficient. The Government’s promise of setting up more than 100 Smart Cities also creates opportunities for IoT and embedding of technology into the city urban infrastructure.”
HDS’ Vivekanand Venugopal states, “IoT can help automate solutions to problems faced by various industries like agriculture, health services, energy, security, disaster management through remotely connected devices. The Indian Government has plans to develop 100 smart cities in the country, for which Rs 7,060 crore has been earmarked in the current year’s budget. Infact, Indian government initiatives like Make in India, Digital India and Smart Cities will require the coming together of all sectors including IoT implementations to make them possible and sustainable.” A number of IoT related such developments have already taken place, Fujitsu’s Andy Stevenson says, “There are multiple IoT related developments taking place in the Indian public sector, especially in the healthcare, education, and manufacturing sector. In 2005, Karnataka offered tele-education in schools and colleges for the first time through EDUSAT. Today, over 2000 government schools in rural areas are seeing a positive change thanks to the application of tele-education. Tele-medicine is another IoT related public sector initiative that’s developing at a rapid pace. With over 105 tele-medicine centers spread across the country, people in remote areas are now able to gain access to medical help.”
Challenges that come with IoT
India as a market for IoT is still in a very early phase. There is a lot of understanding yet to be garnered, which makes risk awareness a key. RV Raghu of ISACA says, “Indian market needs to mature further on several aspects relating to IoT. IoT could potentially be the driver to ensure not only connectivity but also effective connectivity which can be leveraged by devices and business which rely on these devices. There is an absence of standard which can be used these could be national/regional or international standards to which mandatory adherence should be ensured so as to as to assure security, interoperability and scalability. The statutory and regulatory frame work which always plays catch-up needs to be keyed in and such keying should happen quickly so that instead of a reactive approach to say a breach or loss of data or a crime, the statutory and regulatory framework is available as a reference point and potentially a deterrent.”
Stevenson of Fujitsu believes collaboration is key to management and protection of the vast amount of data that comes with IoT, “Lack of collaboration is another risk associated with IoT. The entire process of digital transformation isn’t the sole responsibility of a business unit or the IT department. The lack of communication between teams can lead to each of them having a different perception about IoT. In the long run, this will do more harm than benefit. There are the heightened security risks that have to be dealt with. The hacking of one connected device is enough to affect all the networks or devices connected it.”
The Aspect of Enterprise Security
IoT brings with it a vast amount of Data, and the collaboration and connectivity brings with it a number of security loopholes, addressing which is an inevitable priority for enterprises. George Chacko of Brocade believes, “Since IoT is a concept of devices talking to one another, there is a lot of data transfer happening which is vulnerable to cyber threats as well. The cloud can work as a catalyst to make IoT work and for that, there has to be a right kind of framework that can assist it. The GRC (governance, risk management and compliance) guidelines can play an important part to make IoT work in a proper manner. So security strategies must include capabilities for fast identification and notification of possible breaches. Companies focused on embedded security are actively developing software and toolkits for IoT developers to leverage.”
Fujitsu’s Andy Stevenson believes enterprises are revising their traditional approaches to security in the face of IoT advancements, “While on one hand IoT is expanding the limits of technology beyond our imagination, but it is also opening up greater avenues for cybercriminals. Enterprises are recognizing that security presents a major roadblock, and they are accordingly adopting solutions to secure the network. Enterprises are reconsidering the traditional approaches to cybersecurity in the present environment of connected devices, and are implementing stringent measures to ensure paramount security.”
“Enterprises are alert about the situation and consider security as one of the top most factors. Given that by nature IoT is in the public domain, built-in security is imminent. Micro-segmentation security solutions like Stealth have a key role to play in IoT and already companies like Unisys are working on advanced security solutions, specifically for IoT environments,” says Unisys’ KNageshwar Rao. Telit India’s Ashish Gulati states that addressing these issues as soon as possible should be priority, “Security and privacy concerns on deployments must be addressed for IoT to succeed. If the proper balance is not struck between the benefits and individual privacy and security, the evolution of the IoT is likely to be seriously compromised. The ongoing deployment of IoT devices is already creating serious issues and discussions about the privacy of users, IoT security, and the potential threat of cyber criminals taking control of sensors and smart devices connected to the Internet. Given the diversity that will exist among these devices, organizations will need to conduct customized risk assessments, often relying on third-party expertise, to identify what the risks are and how best to contain them.”
IoT in Future
The industry believes that IoT in India has just taken baby steps and there is an immense scope of growth, as Telit India’s Ashish Gulati puts it, “The growth in IoT will far exceed that of other connected devices. In India IoT is at its initial stages and waiting to explode. Government sector would be one large contributor to the growth of IoT. IT services companies like Infosys, Wipro, TCS and Tech Mahindra are working on designing and developing solutions to make smart cities. Besides these IT services giants, a number of start-ups are also working on design and development of IoT.” Dr. Chowdhury too believes that growth would be fuelled by the developments in public sector shifting towards IOT application, “Public sector is a big user of IoT worldwide and all the Smart City initiatives are an example of that. Sensors are being added for tracking water, power, gas distribution, garbage collection, traffic management, security alerts, space management, Smart LED lighting etc. Public Sector companies like Railways and Power companies also have enormous opportunities to use IoT to automate their processes.”
Fujitsu’s Stevenson also believes that success of projects like smart cities is pivotal to the IoT scenario in future for India, “The integration of technology and IoT will provide the resources required to make the cities smart in terms of installing RFID tags, GPS sensor, scanners etc. In other words, IoT will be the key to achieving the intelligent management that smart cities promise. Once IoT has been completely implemented in all possible spheres, the entry of new players with new business models and approaches will change the face of the entire industry.” Sai Pratyush of Tata Teleservices opines that IoT will make the world appear differently, “Over the next decade, IoT is expected to see huge adoption across sectors. It is expected to bring billions of data-generating devices online and connect a vast stream of data with people, processes and other devices.”
Finally,
The Internet of Things phenomenon is appealing on all fronts, be it enterprise level usage or public sector and governance. Meticulous tasks like utility and supply management, aggregations, weather and disaster prediction and response, logistics management, systems and hazard monitoring and many such activities will become totally independent of day to day human influence, truly transforming societies and organizations.
The Digital India initiative has created a strategic roadmap to build and strengthen domain competency and place India on the global IoT map. IoT applications for the manufacturing sector whether it is automation or supply chain management would be a key growth area in India.
On the enterprise front, a business leader interested in the IoT should have a very clear understanding of the business case for IoT and how IoT maps into the long term strategy of the business. An investment in IoT should be based on a clear strategy and understanding of the risks and opportunities in the context of the organization/business. The aim of the IoT strategy is to make the business more successful and deliver sustainable business advantage. It should enable new insights into their business to drive new ways of working; and to create new innovative business models and services that can be offered. Going virtual, mobile, and social are three mega trends that are creating a world of opportunities for organizations to effectively and efficiently connect with their customers, employees and ecosystem partners. Specific use of data and the corresponding analytics is where CIOs should be more focused.
By: Chitresh Sehgal
