The cost of networking devices is falling steadily. According to Gartner estimates, the costs will only amount to 1$ per device by 2020 [1]. The networking of smart products to create smart services will therefore continue to progress in the coming years. The development and application of IoT standards and best practices will have to make a significant contribution to reducing costs in IoT projects.
Standardization efforts in the field of the Internet of Things have been underway for many years. The number of technologies and protocols that want to become IoT standards is growing almost just as fast as the Internet of Things itself. Examples of this are
- Open Internet Consortium (Intel, dell broadcom, Samsung and others): IoTivity is a framework for securely and reliably connecting devices to each other and the Internet. The focus is on a cross-operating system and network protocol solution.
- Thread (ARM, Samsung, NEST, somfy and others): Thread is a secure network protocol for networking products around the home. The aim is to create a proprietary standard for networking things in the home.
- Apple: The Apple HomeKit stands for the networking of various devices with Apple iOS.
- Google: Google has just presented Brillo and Weave at its own Google I/O trade fair, which also enable the manufacturer-independent and secure connection of devices with each other, the cell phone and the cloud.
- Allseen Alliance (Microsoft, Qualcomm, Panasonic and others): The AllJoyn Open Source Framework wants to establish a cross-industry open standard for networking products on the Internet.
- OneM2M: OneM2M is an overarching group that unites several standardization organizations under one roof. The aim is to establish an M2M service layer as a standard that can be easily integrated into the hardware and takes care of networking.
However, a concrete standard has not yet been established. The reasons for this include the large number of different products and applications and the different interests of the companies involved in agreeing on a standard.
All of these IoT standards have one thing in common: they focus on the technology for networking products and transferring data between the various devices. However, IoT projects involve many more aspects and challenges that require standardization or the establishment of best practices:
- Companies that have always designed and manufactured products can gain insights into how customers use them as they evolve into smart, connected products. They can stay informed about usage throughout the entire product lifecycle. To do this, it is necessary to expand the corporate strategy to include IoT issues and consistently align projects with this strategy.
- IoT projects not only offer a multitude of opportunities for companies, but also entail their own risks, which must be considered in project management and measures to minimize risks must be permanently anchored.
- IoT "marries" the hardware world with the software world. This requires cooperation between fundamentally different disciplines and represents a major challenge that must be considered in IoT projects.
This cross-disciplinary perspective on companies and projects in the IoT environment is also adopted by the Ignite IoT framework [2]. Based on case studies and analyses of IoT projects in a wide range of disciplines, Ignite IoT is a framework that provides best practices for project managers, architects and other IoT stakeholders.
Read in the second part of this blog serieshow the Ignite IoT Framework deals with the aspects of projects in the IoT environment and how we at doubleSlash meet these challenges.
Sources:
[1] http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2636073
[2] http://enterprise-IoT.org/
