Internet of Things & Big Data

Internet of Things (IoT) is a “widespread presence of various of devices such as sensors, actuators and mobile phones that provides capability to interact and cooperate with each other to reach common goals”.

There are two majors driving forces behind the development of IoT as following:

• Increase ease of connections to sensors 

Sensors are capable to interact with different devices regardless of different technologies that they have. For example, sensor in the key may unlock the door at the house and communicate message that allow the lights to turn on and thermostat sets room temperature to normal.

• Improved ability to access and analyze the data generated

IoT provides marketing automation that capable to produce customer information such as their preferences, hobbies etc. Multinational companies can deploy the information to sell their offerings and create customer-focused products and services. Companies will be able to interact and captivate more potential customer and establish loyal customer at once.

Some of the few examples of IoT applications that we are able to identify in real life are:

• Smart buildings

Intel, American multinational corporation and technology company has been adopted smart buildings on their operations. Intel’s are adopting ecosystem of equipment manufacturers and systems integrators that rely on Intel’s technology to execute smart building solutions that are secure, scalable and interoperable.

A solid technology foundation that they have implemented are including:

                        1) Accelerate Development

Using Intel’s pre-validated building blocks with design resources and development tools to accelerate the process of delivering smart building IoT products and solutions.

2) Add Intelligence Anywhere

Intel put its data across building operations to acquire higher level of business     intelligence.

         3) Consolidate Systems

Intel enables high performance and virtualization to gather information and operation technology.

• Smart appliances

LG Artificial Intelligence platform, Instaview ThinQ, allow Alexa to inform customers on the recipes and add it to the shopping list when the ingredients are run out. The smart fridge provides apps to allow customers to put more ingredients on the fridge. 

Amazon Dash buttons let customers restock the content with just one tap while two taps will turn the display on transparent where customers can check the ingredients inside the fridge. It also provides panoramic camera where customers can look inside the fridge through their mobile phones.

• Smart TV

Samsung launched Smart TVs to provide access of streaming content where customers will be able to search their favorite movies, games etc. while connect to other devices. There are several features of Samsung Smart TVs that people can enjoy which are:

1) Streamlined for simplicity

Samsung provides seamless connections with intuitive features that avoid false assumptions of Smart TV.

              2) An intelligent, holistic experience

Smart TV along with Smart Things are able to connect to extensive range of connected devices in the house to automate life and make life easier.

                   3) Endless entertainment

Universal Guide feature bring all your favorite movies, shows and music in one place and provide recommendations to customer who might find it difficult to choose the content that they want to watch.

             4) Intuitive controls

Samsung Smart TV provide easy connections through One Remote and Auto Detect. The voice assistant command customers to ease the process of setup and find contents faster.

            5) Effortless home control

Customers will be able to control their connected devices at their    convenience with Samsung Smart TV such as changing room temperature and viewing security cameras.

• Wearables

Apple’s own technology extension products, Apple Watch is the first wearable device and smartwatch. Apple Watch monitor health and fitness, track the user’s movement, heartrate and activity with built-in sensors that provide review and analysis of the data through Apple’s Health App. 

They have launched two new apps, Fitness and Workout. Fitness records general activity, steps and calories burned while Workout tracks activity for workout provided like personal trainer and give information about user’s heart rate and movement.

Big data is “datasets that helps companies to manage, store and analyze their database software”.

Big data are classified into four sources such as:

• Internal = Data that belongs to organization’s firewall. E.g. Data storage and archives
• External = Data that belongs to outsiders of organization’s firewall. E.g. public web
• Unstructured = Data that does not have a pre-defined data model or is not organized in a pre-defined manner
• Structured = Data that belongs in a fixed field within a record or file

Big data operates according to the principle of 3V as following:

• Velocity = The rate which data is generated and changed
• Variety = Number of different data sources and types
• Volume = Average quantity of data units per category

There are several ways to turn big data into value with several analytics to undertake by looking at the source that classified as:

• Media

It is the most popular source of big data as it provides information on customer preferences and trends. Companies may be able to obtain insight from their target audience, draw patterns and conclusions and elevate their decision making. 

Media includes social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and generic media such as images, audio, video that delivers quantitative and qualitative insights that companies can gain benefits from. It will help companies to execute audio, video and social media analytics from this source.

• Cloud

Cloud manages storage of structured and unstructured data that provides real-time information and on-demand insights. It is a very efficient and economical data source. Companies may implement text analytics where they can look through the data and extract meaning from various themes of data.

• Web

Public web is very accessible to people across the world where they can visit instantly. For example, Wikipedia delivers informational insights for free access to their readers. Companies will not need to develop big data to gain leverage on their businesses. 

• IoT

Internet of things produce data that can bring value of big data that are yielded from sensors that are connected to electronic devices. IoT data includes big data generated that comes from every device that releases data. 

• Databases

Nowadays, companies use a mix of traditional and modern databases to obtain relevant big data. The databases give insights that can be used to enhance business profits. Web, IoT and databases are extremely important sources for companies to conduct predictive analytics to look data from past and present and predict customer’s future behavior.

Internet of Things and big data are mutually dependent where both of them must co-exist hence companies can utilize it to gain profits and establish successful businesses. Companies must develop their own technologies and system to facilitate the operation of these tools that contribute to be a valuable source for the businesses and bring value to customers simultaneously. 

What do you think of IoT and big data? Do you find it useful for businesses? Or maybe you have other alternatives and solutions that you can suggest for the companies? Feel free to tell me all your thoughts in the comment section below. Thanks for reading my post and have a great day.