Unlock the value in unwanted data generated by connected devices.
The IoT gold rush may be focused on consumer devices such as fitness trackers, but the prize could be even greater if we can unlock the hidden treasures in the data that consumer and industrial M2M devices create.
McKinsey believes that IoT could generate up to $11 trillion a year in economic value by 2025, with a large proportion of this due to the data goldmine.
To achieve this remarkable growth (which is equivalent of around 11 percent of the world’s economy), there are several technical, organizational, and regulatory hurdles to overcome. For a start, the huge volume of IoT data needs to be processed and analyzed in real time if it is to be in any way useful to organizations.
Take for example connected cars: a Quartz/Hitachi report estimates that connected cars will have the ability to upload twenty-five gigabytes of data to the cloud every hour. This data comes from the sensors that collect data on everything from fuel efficiency to safety checks.
Data driven insight can increase performance, drive business change and provide detailed information on customers and their behaviors. But many organizations are just scratching the surface of what is possible. McKinsey analyzed operations at an oil rig with around 30,000 sensors and found that only around 1 percent of the data was used – and this was primarily for anomaly detection and control.
While many organizations have invested heavily in data collection, they are disappointed because they have not realized the value they expected. “Companies just aren’t taking advantage of this opportunity,” explains Thierry Evangelista, global portfolio and roadmap director, Orange Business. “It is estimated that just 1 percent of data collected is actually used, the rest is thrown away or left in the cloud, unused.”
Part of the problem is the lack of integration between the different datasets. In the oil rig example, the data typically never left for the rig for analysis and didn’t reach senior decision makers. The industry experts interviewed for the report said that analysis of the data could for example improve effectiveness of equipment maintenance by two or three times.
Turning data into actionable intelligence
Acquiring the data is only the first part of the journey. To turn it into actionable intelligence, organizations need to address the four “Vs” of big data analysis as outlined by IBM.
- Volume: 2.5 quintillion bytes of data can be created every day.
- Variety: data includes everything from tweets to healthcare device data.
- Velocity: data from connected car sensors, for example, have more value if they are analyzed in real time.
- Veracity: how can I be sure that my data is accurate?
This requires an approach that can capture multiple data streams, transmit them from anywhere and analyze them in real time. To this end, Orange Business has created the Datavenue modular offer, capable of collecting and analyzing data from anywhere. This end-to-end platform covers the complete data journey.
Datavenue was first made available in France in 2015 and now processes 65 million items of technical data per minute in France and Belgium. It is made up of four modules - Select, Connect, Manage and Control - and is supported by 700 IoT and analytics experts worldwide.
Data is gathered using a range of certified and tested connected objects, such as sensors and cameras. This data is then transmitted using the appropriate connectivity solution. These include future-proof global cellular networks and capabilities, such as eUiCC, worldwide fixed and satellite networks, as well as low-power solutions, such as LoRa.
On the data management side, Orange offers both cloud-based and on-premises software solutions that extend to remote device management, processing and virtualization. Finally, Orange ensures end-to-end security and data protection, integration with information systems and service scalability, so that customers can have ultimate trust in the platform to make informed decisions.
By 2020, Gartner predicts that more than half of major new business processes and systems will incorporate some element of IoT. “Analytics contribute to the success of IoT systems. To succeed organizations must realize that IoT and big data are strategic partners,” concludes Evangelista.
If you are looking to get powerful insight into your IoT data and plan a route to more informed decision making, find out more about Orange Business Datavenue solution here.