451 Research says Wearables moving from niche consumer interest to the enterprise

New York-based 451 Research, an IT research and advisory company, has determined that cellular/mobile Internet of Things (IoT) and machine-to-machine (M2M) connections will increase nearly fourfold globally from 252 million in 2014 to 908 million in 2019.

This monumental increase will be driven by a number of factors, says the firm. First, falling hardware and bandwidth costs enable enterprises to reap the benefits of virtualising the physical world. Second, cloud-based middleware and data platforms are making it easier to securely generate insights from machine data at a greater scale than ever before possible. Third is the awareness of the transformational potential of IoT/M2M for return on investment (ROI), competitiveness and new business models. This buzz has generated a massive amount of merger and acquisition (M&A) activity.

The latest 451 Research data report shows that connected passenger vehicles and connected energy/smart home will lead the market in terms of connection volume while emerging solutions such as ‘pay as you drive’ insurance will grow the fastest.

“We continue to be bullish that ultimately the hype of IoT will be proven to be warranted back on business impact,” said Brian Partridge, Research vice president. “Over the forecast period we expect that M2M/IoT solution suppliers will find fertile ground in vertical markets such as retail and government that will adopt IoT/M2M to enable strategic digitisation strategies such as smart cities and the use of digital signage, mobile point of sale, and connected kiosks to drive the transformation from brick and mortar to click and mortar.”

451 Research has also released a new long form report titled “Time for Work: Smart Watch App Development Turns to the Enterprise”.  Key findings in the report, backed by recent 451 IT Decision Maker survey results, showed 39% of US IT decision-makers at companies that use or plan to use wearable technologies will deploy solutions in the next six months; 24% plan to deploy in the next 12 months. In addition, 81% of US IT decision-makers who say their company plans to deploy wearables in the next six months will favour smart watches.

“The release of Apple Watch has opened the flood gates governing wearables’ adoption,” said Ryan Martin, analyst, IoT and Wearable Technologies. “But now that the river is running, it’s less about where it will end and more about where – and when – to start.  We expect wearable technology to deliver a key interface and input into the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT). Wearables have the potential to become an interface – if not the interface – for IIoT access.”

As defined by 451 Research, IoT is the interconnected set of intelligent devices, objects and wearables designed specifically to enable the virtualisation of the physical world.  These devices create new value, services and perspectives through sharing and thorough analysis of M2M data. 451 Research will hold a webinar, Navigating the Internet of Everything, to discuss key developments across the IoT ecosystem including areas of innovation in IoT security, connectivity architecture, the role of cloud, APIs, middleware and data management platforms. Click here to register for the webinar, taking place on Tuesday, June 16, from 17.00 – 18.00 UK.

For more information go to: https://451research.com/internet-of-things