Quite shortly in the future, businesses in most industries will no longer be able to remain competitive and demanding on the market without smartly connected machines, devices, systems, which are generally called the Internet of Things (IoT). Companies are pursuing the goal of making accurate decisions, bringing excellent service delivery to customers, thus, automizing the operations by connecting everything together. The IoT technologies allowed people to deliver any type of the required data anywhere, anytime, anyplace. Whether wireless or wired connections, we manage to bring people to people, machines to people, and things to things. Moreover, I was embraced by the fact that IoT is invading the industries that I believed have nothing in common. Let me demonstrate how IoT makes things easier in every sphere of life.
IoT Technologies Are Breaking the Familiar Business Patterns
All services we get these days are possible with the use of hardware development and software development. The companies are embracing more and more devices, applications, and other tools to make our lives easier. IoT technologies are rapidly increasing in both industries and give the customers excellent experiences.
Hardware development, which includes all physical computer components such as monitor, mouse, central processing unit, data storage, circuit board, graphics card, and other essential elements is on the go with IoT. These units are not only interconnected but also contain sensors for monitoring and controlling activities. My AirPods and SmartWatch lose the signal if I step away from it for 5 meters; maybe because it has sensors that define the proximity of both devices? But IoT for hardware development isn’t limited to the computing industry. Companies that deal with agriculture (precipitation forecasting devices, wind turbines) have long ago realized a need for IoT solutions to become “smart”, thus, they needed to connect it to the Cloud. Here comes more: companies that manufacture smart house devices, like cameras. As soon as I enter the territory of the house, the camera on the gates turns toward me as they are installed with sensors to recognize any kind of movement.
Collecting the data, integrating the devices, doing real-time analytics, and process data are all possible with software development. Starting from the airline industry to obvious media platforms require software to track, collect, store, process, and analyze the data. Crop monitoring applications are used to collect the data on the soil condition (affected by the number of precipitations), fertility, and other factors that are used by farmers to make the crop season rich. Health and fitness tracking applications are able to sense our heartbeat, pulse, body temperature to calculate the number of calories burned during a workout.
8 Unexpectable Industries Where IoT Could Be a Great Extension and Development
IoT development has been widely and rapidly applied in healthcare, banking, and business industries, there are still some unusual sectors where IoT made a breakthrough. I have come across 8 industries that are slowly incorporating IoT technologies to connect to customers, improve efficiency, and facilitate daily operations.
✔ Agriculture
I could never imagine how IoT technologies can change the way my parents do gardening. Smart farming is becoming more and more used not only by large food-producing corporations but among private farmers in small villages. The IoT platform on crop monitoring is able to calculate the number of fertilizers and best-appropriate time for their spraying by accurately collecting the data on the soil surface. The machinery used in farming is installed with numerous sensitive devices that analyze the field indicators, such as the level of moisture, vegetation, fertility, and inform the farmers (by notifying through e-mail or in the application) on the needed actions.
✔ Hospitality
Hotels and other accommodation providers are drastically implementing facial recognition devices to know their visitors more. The sensors on the cameras analyze the emotional state of the guest to the extent that hotel employees may know if they are hungry or tired. Such breathtaking innovations enhance the services of hotels by meeting the needs of travelers even before they recognize such themselves.
✔ Advertising
Ads are everywhere - Facebook and Instagram feed, web pages, our phone applications. Sometimes, I don’t even notice how my buying behavior is changing under these marketing manipulations: I see the ads and skip it, but in the nearest future - here I am, ordering the thing that I didn’t think I would need and use. One of the examples of recent traps that I was caught in this industry is the introduction of smart water bottles. It analyzes my drinking habits, reminds me of the necessity to sip water, and calculates the amount of water consumed throughout the day. At the end of the day, I receive a list of recommendations and information on the importance of water, how it can change my overall health, and other well-being indicators.
✔ Automobile
The use of IoT in this industry is not limited to the manufacturing of smart or electric cars. Another area of IoT implementation refers to fuel-saving applications that analyze drivers’ behavior to help them smartly fueling their tanks. They also conduct the monitoring of car parts such as gears, breaks, oil level, battery, and overall engine condition.
✔ Railway Industry
Not only IoT development in this sector helps reduce the traffic and delays, but devices developed with the IoT technologies analyze the state of railways and train engines as well to make sure the maintenance is conducted in a timely manner. Therefore, my traveling safety is guaranteed, and if something goes wrong, the engineers receive warning or notification to the destination center that the train requires inspection.
✔ Waste Management
Garbage bins with sensors that define their usefulness and need to be taken by local services? Yes, that’s right. These sensors identify the time taken when the garbage bin is full and notifies the cleaning companies to clean them up. This practice is useful for logistics purposes as the applications help reduce the costs for fuel consumption of the sanitation department vehicles and properly manage the timing of cleaning the bins. These sensors would be a real necessity in my neighborhood which turns into a rubbish dump after weekends.
✔ Military
With all the war situations in many countries and the immense potential of the US army, applications designed by IoT engineers are being inserted into drones, tanks, planes, and operating bases to assess the risks on particular territories and define response time.
✔ Real Estate
Many ways of real estate activities can be infiltrated by IoT technologies. Sales can be boosted by showing the clients a high-definition 360 angle picture and videos in real-time, and the search for suitable accommodation is possible through analyzing clients’ needs and requirements which are uploaded in the applications. They search for the neighborhood, house/apartment size, surrounding area, and other facilities.
Myth or Reality: Is It Hard to Find Someone Able to Cover Your Need in the Bespoke IoT Technology Development
Custom business needs in the industries that haven’t been much used IoT technologies required companies to hire developers with this specific experience and skill set. Outsourcing allows them to find a qualified IoT developer all over the globe if the domestic market is at scarcity. The use of IoT technology led to a 34% increase in the number of developers occupied in this sector. In 2016, Ukraine was included in the top 35 ranking countries with a large number of IoT developers presented in the IT market. International companies are hiring remote teams and opening their R&D centers in the country to get quality and demanding services of IoT development.
There are still so many industries and areas of services where IoT technologies are still expected to come. With the emerging need to connect everything that can and need to be connected, this technology allows this practice to be done at ease. I believe that a unified system of technologies that form the Internet of Things is automizing the environment around us in both developing and developed economies. I can monitor my crop from home, be sure of the safety of flights, track my health indicators via smart bottles and watches, as well as breathing fresh air after trucks remove the garbage based on the signals received from the bins sensors.
