IoT, or Internet of Things, is a worldwide-recognized trend that is gaining popularity incredibly fast. The secret lies in the fact that IoT transformed a number of industries and took them to the new level, and these industries include healthcare, finances and much more. No wonder there is such a hype about it – there are new opportunities with IoT popping out every couple months so we highly recommend you keep an eye on that technology. In order to make it easier for you, we decided to list down the most possible IoT trends for 2018 and explain the reason behind that.
Expansion of number of devices
IoT is all about connecting devices together and exchanging the data, so guess what – in 2018 there will be even more interconnected devices. And it does not mean mobile phones and laptops only – there will be more “smart” devices that we use on daily basis, like smart doors, smart locks and much more. The growth of the number of “smart” devices will allow expanding the processes that utilize IoT and thus make them easier and more accurate. In addition, IoT will become more available, meaning it will be used not only for some industries but for personal use on daily basis. This leads to the concept of smart cities where a lot of processes will be dictated by IoT. And while it sounds a bit of a utopia, some countries have already started developing and realizing the concept of smart cities, so we might be seeing something really revolutionary in the future.
For example, CSCO gives an estimation of the growth in the IoT that number of connected devices will exceed 50 billion by 2020.
Heavier use of mobile devices
In order to connect with “smart” devices, users have to have a personal device for managing smart homes, etc. And since the number of mobile users in the world is enormous and keeps getting bigger, it’s quite an obvious prediction that smartphones will have a bigger role in IoT in the future. Of course, it would make our lives much easier because we will be spending less time and effort on certain actions.
Personalized marketing platforms
Thanks to the access to your personal information and overall processing of the great amount of data, marketers will be able to place personal advertisements on mobile phones or other platforms depending on user behavior and profile. Such approach will transform the relationship between a user and product owner as more attention will be paid to user needs and business owners will be empowered with a lot of information about the customer, which will be used to develop a maximally efficient approach and offer.
Security concerns
However, such heavy use of interconnected devices and IoT will lead to a serious concern about security. Even now the cyber attacks are rather frequent and it could become even worse. So before implementing all the planned innovations in real life, firstly we all need to consider the possible security breaches and vulnerabilities and make sure the data would be 100% safe.
No Place To Hide: With the Internet of Things spreading throughout our homes, cars, and even bodies, new vulnerabilities seem to emerge almost daily. The smart locks and security systems in your home could be disabled by a would-be burglar. Your car could be forced to unlock its doors and start its engines; a thief would only have to get in and drive. Implanted pacemakers and insulin pumps are also vulnerable to hacking.
Big Data and AI
Speaking about the data: since there will be more smart devices and we will use IoT much more than we do now, the amount of processed data will grow too. So we will have to work with Big Data a lot and thus we will have to think of resources that would enable us to process and analyze it correctly. Here artificial intelligence and machine learning will come in handy because with these technologies we will be receiving more precise results and analytics in comparison to calculations performed by manpower.
Summing up, Internet of Things has a huge potential and can be used in almost any sphere of our lives. If implemented properly, it can cause incredible changes that will affect both the industries with governmental sectors and lives of single users. Even know IoT is used heavily and a lot of IT companies already offer services related to this technology. So if you have an awesome project in mind, don’t hesitate to reach to a reliable software development company. If they aren’t’ able to help you with development, at least you will receive a helpful consultation on your next steps.
