The mass adoption of IoT is a no-brainer, right? It’s easy to say, especially for an IoT company. But, actually, enterprises consistently raise a long list of objections when considering IoT as a means to drive digital change. Here are the five most common objections, and an explanation of why they should be embraced and solved – and must be embraced and solved if IoT is ever to gain massive scale.
There is no way to dissect IoT without understanding the potential impact is big, but so also is the risk. The ideal scenario is where a decision maker has a single crystal clear pain-point to resolve with an IoT solution. Let’s take an example: a supply chain manager manages 200 transport boxes and loses 10 percent of them each year. These boxes are not cheap, either – so he is not just losing inventory in the box, but is also facing a cost to replace the box. This is a well defined challenge, and an IoT tracker is a well-defined solution.
But it is not so simple. A tracking solution should go deeper, and impact an organization at its core. The real value with IoT, in this case, comes when all the transport boxes (not just the 200 most expensive ones) are connected at different location, providing a level of interconnectivity that allows the company to optimize and refine all their related processes – including inventory, logistics, replacement, maintenance, invoicing, customer service, and so on. And that way to generate actionable insights and process intelligence.
As IoT becomes a core operational driver, massive opportunities are created. But there are technical constraints, always, and it is always a gamble in the end. Risks and uncertainties; again, the impact is big and so is the risk. Which is to say: it is understandable that industry buyers would have some concerns, still, before joining the IoT movement, and making it ‘massive IoT’. So here are the five most important concerns we, as a supplier industry, face when consulting with enterprises on IoT projects.
1 | Where are the standards?
When speaking about standardization, it is almost mandatory to bring up the pickle of Betamax video standard or Minidisc audio system. Both were promising technologies, but neither became the standard. It is typical with new technologies that alternatives emerge alongside – some of these will become standards, while others will die over time. IoT is not very different. In the last 10 years, numerous technologies have popped up, each fighting its place in the history books. But standardization is more apparent in the last three years.
GPS, BLE, and Wi-Fi are all standards in the IoT space for low-power localization; REST API and MQTT are standards for sharing data between IT platforms. Similarly, cellular low-power wide-area (LPWA) connectivity (NB-IoT and LTE-M) is becoming the standard in radio-based public networks (as they are globally adopted in the 4G/5G standard). But there is no one-size-fits-all technology; each has its strengths and weaknesses. But standards bring opportunities to optimize – to have multiple providers and compare costs.
Standards function as insurance for the buyer and are therefore crucial for mass adoption.
2 | What is the next big thing?
With standards coms the possibility of disruptors, as well. In 2021, Apple launched its Airtag tracker, for tracking valuables, which has quickly developed into a $1 billion business. Similarly, the first IoT sensor prototypes to use energy harvesting are emerging, with claims they never need charging or battery replacements. Does this mean long-life battery-powered sensors are a thing of the past? Likely not, since energy harvesting has not been validated at scale, as yet – and unproven solutions present a risk for users.
But we do love these evolutions, and we also need to think twice before integrating a technology that needs to run for many years. These evolutions make our sector amazingly interesting, and we follow them closely, but some of them are still too underdeveloped for enterprises to base future processes on.
3 | Why is it so expensive?
While price is an obvious objection when it comes to the implementation of new technologies, the industry – collectively – sometimes fails to recognize the total life-cycle cost. We should not only look at the initial cost of installation, but rather work with our clients to show them the full picture – including what cost reductions they can gain by installing the solution. Streamlined training, efficient installation, and optimized power functions directly compensates for a higher initial investment cost.
But only if the sales side is willing to have that discussion with clients and go beyond comparing upfront costs. In essence, you need to know the ‘unit cost’ per ‘relevant business data point’ and optimize the solution to completely control this cost over the lifetime. If you do that, IoT-generated business data clearly outweighs the costs, and it is a straightforward investment.
4 | What if things go wrong?
This is what every CEO thinks. As business owners, we have all made mistakes; we have all had things go wrong, and we all anticipate that things may go wrong in the future. But speaking from experience, our company has learned from its mistakes over the last 10 years, and evolved. Every time, we took the hit and we solved it – and, equally important, we reflected strategically, and responded with innovation and hard work.
In that sense, trust, transparency, and improvement is the key – and, alongside that, the right procedures so the data is not lost, even in the worst case scenario.
5 | What about the manpower?
As much as I like to brag about the simplicity and elegance of our IoT solutions – that they are plug-and-play and work-out-of-the-box, and can be self-installed in less than a minute – I realize the worry for enterprises is not just about the installation. They are opening Pandora’s box when they commission an unfamiliar IoT solution. They must already cope with the slings and arrows – pandemic, inflation, supply chain disruption, geo-political instability, the ‘great resignation’ – and they do not want additional pressures on their teams.
Often, the customer gets the essential value proposition, but still fears the unexpected challenges related to implementation, adoption and maintenance – and the operational impact if everything goes south. But this is not an objection, actually; it is just another problem that has to be solved. Ultimately, it often comes down to trust and transparency – the secret ingredients in any customer-supplier relationship, if you will. It is about handling your business with care, and working with the right partners to handle your business with the same care.
Mass adoption of IoT comes when you deal with all of these possible objections, and learn from then. This is a journey, where small steps are equally important to big ones.
Kristoff Van Rattinghe is the CEO of IoT firm Sensolus, founded in Ghent in Belgium in 2013. Sensolus works in a variety of industries, including aerospace, automotive, logistics, manufacturing, and waste management. Customers such as Airbus, Atlas Copco, and AB InBev rely on Sensolus’ IoT solutions on a daily basis.
