Panel discussion at Dell World focuses on the transformative power of the ‘Internet of Things’ in both consumer and industrial applications
AUSTIN, Texas – The Dell World exhibition closed on Thursday with an insightful panel on how “Internet of Things” technology promises to shape the future of the connected world.
Hosted by Aarti Shahani, a tech reporter for NPR Business Desk, panelists were Alexis Ohanian, co-founder and executive chairman at Reddit; Aneesh Chopra, co-founder and EVP at Hunch Analytics; Paul Rogers, president and CEO of Wurldtech and GM of GE Industrial Cyber Security; Geoff McGrath, chief innovation officer at McLaren Applied Technologies; Joyce Mullen, VP and GM for Dell OEM Solutions; and Michael Raynor, director with Deloitte Services.
Shahani framed the conversation: “The point of this panel is basically to talk about the Internet of Things, the promises, the applications, the way it’s being used in the enterprise and for the consumer. And to talk about things about it that are inspiring and maybe also scary. It’s clearly one area where arguably technology is outpacing our ability to process it, manage it, regulate it and use it.”
Shahani kicked off the talk by asking what stands out to each of the panelists in the evolving IoT landscape.
Rogers, speaking for GE, said, “When you think in terms of GE, when we think in IoT, we look at it from an asset perspective. We’ve made a $1 billion investment on the West Coast to go after that market. You have 50 billion assets being connected by 2020 with $15 trillion worth of [gross domestic product] value by 2030.”
Raynor said, “Something that I find fascinating … is the way in which different technologies are being commercialized,” with an eye on potentially disruptive innovations. “A way to start out at the fringes of a hard problem and sneak up on those hard problems from the side. There are other problems where we’re taking both problems simultaneously. Sometimes it’s going after the mainstream right out of the box.”
Ohanian said he takes the perspective of an early stage tech investor. “I’m just excited to finally have the future arrive, the one I was promised in movies.”
Ohanian called out the Tesla Model S, which gained some autonomous driving features via a software update earlier this month, and connected cars in general. “It’s so cool to see so many smart, well-funded people trying to solve this problem that I really believe is going to make our roads a lot safer and make our lives a lot better.”
The entire panel discussion is available here.
