IoT and the bandwidth dilemma

To help you improve your data bandwidth, read our How to improve data efficiency whitepaper.

IoT is set to revolutionize industries and change lives, but to connect and sustain this new and exciting interconnected world, data transmission speeds are becoming critical.

The IoT ecosystem embraces any ‘thing’ or sensor that is connected to the internet, from thermostats and medical devices to smart factories and connected cars. These ‘things’ have much to bring to our lives, but there is no escaping the fact that increased data usage is making heftier demands on bandwidth.

If industries and businesses can get it right, connecting the physical and digital worlds could generate up to $11 trillion a year in economic value by 2025, according to a report by the McKinsey Global Institute.  This influx of data being generated by all these connected devices, however, is altering our approach to data transmission efficiency.

Network complexity
IoT is changing the face of networking.  Infrastructures are becoming more complex with an increasing number of ‘things’ that need to be managed, added-on, monitored, replaced or tweaked.

Organizations are increasingly looking at ways they can enhance data speeds and bandwidth without having to make extensive upgrades or having to forsake performance in one area to improve it in another.  

More bandwidth doesn’t automatically equate to faster throughput, however. It is more about how the bandwidth is actually managed from the onset. You need to understand your capacity and requirements and how you can maximize data throughput efficiencies to meet these and scale them up accordingly.

The bandwidth gap
Organizations will need to start planning their bandwidth strategy as more and more data starts to flow in from a variety of sources to avoid the so called ‘bandwidth gap’. But it isn’t just about increasing bandwidth. Organizations also need to look carefully at stricter data traffic management and find ways of maximizing the bandwidth they already have.

There are a number of ways data bandwidth can be improved without making huge investments in system changes such as choosing the right data protocols for the task in hand,  focusing efforts on relevant data, looking at data serialization and processing data locally wherever you can, for example.

Organizations that can meet their IoT needs now and combine forward thinking in their bandwidth planning strategies will be the ones that flourish.

To help you improve your data bandwidth, read our How to improve data efficiency whitepaper.  It also provides a case example of how to enhance remote monitoring of industrial assets such as within mobile power stations. To download the whitepaper click here

 

Glenn Le Santo
Glenn Le Santo

Editor in Chief, International, at Orange Business. I'm in charge of our International website and the English language blogs at Orange Business. In my spare time I'm literally captain of my own ship, spending my time on the wonderful rivers and canals of England.