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This will be the start of a series of “Learn How-To” articles to develop IoT solutions. We will initiate the series with the problem of “Unattended Garbage” that posed a lot of complaints regarding the cleanliness and might cause the outbreak of diseases.

Value is created when you make sense of the right data. But before we start deploying sensors, we also need to define the business problems and the pain points from different stakeholders. Probably you need to gather a team from various stakeholders or maybe you can start defining yourself and later validated with stakeholders later.

Problem Statement

1. Who is collecting the garbage?
2. What is the status of garbage bin?
3. When was the garbage collected?
4. Where is the location of full bins?
5. How to plan the route of the trucks?
6. How many days till the next collection?
7. How much garbage is produced in an area?
8. Why is the garbage truck not picking up garbage?
9. Why is a particular area producing more garbage?

How-To

1. Garbage level sensors on garbage bins and garbage trucks
2. GPS on garbage trucks
3. Network infrastructure (Wifi, 3G)
4. IOT Middleware (FAVORIOT) — SUBSCRIBE FREE PLAN Now!
5. Visualization dashboard
6. Analytics

This is by no means a comprehensive step-by-step solution but it will help you to start your exciting journey in developing your own IoT solution. Feel free to add your suggestions.

[Original article “ How-To Develop a Smart Garbage Collection” published in IOT World]

Sometimes we wondered why in some countries, Smart Cities initiatives are very successful but others failed — either it was not accepted or fully adopted by the people, or it’s stuck on the Blueprint shelves.

In any Smart Cities implementations, we can’t avoid Internet of Things (IOT) because it’s how we aggregate the data and derive meaningful insights about the cities. Cities that use data as their decision-making process are the ones that will propel forward and lead the rest. They will understand what the current issues are and how to improve the cities operations and reduce costs.

Benchmarking cities and creating city’s indicators are the first steps towards a continuous process of becoming an ROI-driven and green-driven cities. You can’t reach the state of vanity-driven cities without successfully implement the latter.

In fact, the IOT maturity model shows that you need to move from monitoring, controlling, optimizing and finally to autonomous. And we can see that many vanity-driven cities have already reached the stage whereby the city’s assets and infrastructure such as roads, bridges, buildings, parking, transportation, etc. have been partly or wholly monitored and controlled.

The only way that you can plan the way forward if you can also optimize the city’s resources — i.e. understanding where and how congested are the roads, utilization of parking bays, consumption of electricity, etc. It looks like a perfect plan, right? But then, why can’t we see the growth of smart cities around the world as fast as we would expect? What stops or delay them?

Other than the necessary funding, I believed mindset change is the biggest stumbling block. If coupled with certain personal agenda, most projects will fail and become white elephants. IOT devices embedded in strategic locations and assets will be able to uncover many things. The data derived from that single asset will tell you whether the investment that you have put in place being utilized or not. Whether the current way of doing things are cost-effective, or it is the source of leakages concerning money or time.

Be careful of what you will uncover from the data — it can be a gold mine which can reduce your operational costs and increase your productivity, or it can be time-bombs that are already waiting to explode.

People viewed Internet of Things(IOT) — either they save you or “kill” you. It’s like the saying — are you looking a “half-full glass or half-empty glass”.

[Original article “What Will You Discover in IOT & Smart Cities — “Gold Mines” or “Time Bombs”?” published in IOT World]

There are 4 main reasons why telcos are that NOT interested in IOT:

1. The growth of M2M is not as fast as expected. The idea of connecting the machines are not new. Most operators have started offering vehicle tracking and remote meter reading more than ten years ago.
2. The M2M ARPU (Average revenue per user) is low. Probably 4–10 times lower than the normal 3G/4G broadband ARPU.
3. M2M devices (with Sim cards) are difficult to manage. And most of these devices are left unattended. Operational costs can be high.
4. Undecided how and where the telco can add the value. Will it be end-to-end (which is not their core expertise) or only provide connectivity.

When I wrote that points, it was in early 2015. But maybe things have changed now.

Three reasons some telcos start to enter the IOT business.

1. Price war — many telcos offered bundled packages and some with unlimited Data, SMS, and Calls
2. IOT starts to grow and become more matured in certain market verticals — although the hype is still on-going, IOT starts to move from “Monitoring” to “Controlling” and “Optimisation” phases. In these phases, data analytics are key to trigger and make better decision making.
3. The ecosystem is growing — many new players, startups are onboard. Bigger and incumbent players also seek the opportunity. Jump start their business by acquiring the smaller but innovative IOT companies.

But maybe the toughest part will be the business model. The question remained — should the telco provide an end-to-end solution or only part of them? Should they manage the customers or not?

Monetising the IOT Data

As we moved our sensor data to the IOT Cloud, we can manipulate the data for useful applications. In many countries, the government has already started their smart cities projects. However, solely dependent on the government alone can be slow and at times faced with many bureaucratic challenges Thus, the need for a third-party such as IOT service providers to take the lead. These are business entities who deploy and manage sensors by themselves by keeping ownership. They earn by publishing the sensors and sensor data they own through sensor publishers.

We will be able to use the term “Sensing-as-a-Service” meaning that they can provide a free or chargeable service to any person who wishes to view or manipulate the data. It’s also possible to combine different multiple sensor data sources and create many innovative applications such as mixing between parking sensor data and public transport data, between environmental data and flood detection data, between river quality data and fertility of soil data.

An IOT service provider can provide such services, and thus, it will help to open up many other opportunities to generate new ways of monitoring and managing our valuable assets. A new business model can be created by way of monetising the new cloud service called “Sensing-as-a-Service.”

But then, IOT is not all about making new revenue streams. It will start with simple cost reduction and increase productivity. When they have plug the so-called leakages in the processes and resources, only then telcos will be able to help companies to:

1. Generate new revenue streams by developing new innovative products,
2. Better customer experience by making the process more seamless and autonomous,
3. Better retention by understanding the client’s behavior.

What we are seeing is only the tip of the iceberg. IOT offers a vast amount of opportunities that has not been discovered yet. Many companies are still struggling to find the best business model, how to monetize the data and convince the end-users.

Who will win the game? That’s a one billion dollar question and everyone’s guess at the moment.

[Similar article “Monetising Digital Services: Where’s the Profit?” published in IOT World]

People often asked me why Malaysia is slow in adopting Internet of Things. After so much hype, we rarely hear any success stories. Despite that we have been actively talking for more than two years (but if you are talking about M2M, i.e., pre-IOT days, this topic has been discussed for more than a decade). Also, we have been listening to many of IOT seminars regarding the promises of IOT to connect Billions of devices with Trillions of dollars of revenue, we still can’t see much of its implementation here in Malaysia. Why is that so? Why in other countries around the world, the take-up is far better than here?

In fact, I have always stressed the importance of collecting the data because what’s the use of talking about Big Data Analytics and IOT when there are not enough data in analyzing (sigh)? Where are the sensor data? Where is the IOT business?

There is one particular post at one of the IOT Group in LinkedIn that interests me. It’s about IOT frustration survey and the top 5 results are:

1. Hype and Confusion — 40% — the top answer by a wide margin, companies are confused by the bombardment of IoT messages, articles and ads. They are not sure what is true and how to proceed.

2. Implementation Difficulties and Ease of Use Issues — 23% — companies are frustrated by the process of finding the correct IoT hardware and software components for their situation. Where do they find easy ways to design, deploy, administer, and maintain their IoT network?

3. Security of data and transactions — 16% — security is the key frustration for companies that have started on an IoT Strategy Plan (they are past the hype and initial implementation questions) and are facing concerns over data privacy, anti-hacking protection methods and regulations.

4. Lack of IoT Standards — 14% — companies listed frustrations with the many wireless protocols, device clouds, data representation formats, and data analysis tools.

5. High Cost of IoT Deployments — 7% — companies are frustrated with the high cost of purchasing IoT components, software development, and system integration compared to the financial return. Given IoT is in such an early stage, it’s not surprising that Cost is currently lower on the frustration list. But Cost will go to the top of this list over time as IoT components become interoperable and commoditised.

I think Malaysia also faces similar frustrations although not in a particular order. However, I would add the sixth frustration i.e. IOT awareness. People might have heard about IOT but mainly in the consumer space — wearables and smart homes applications. But since the cost is still expensive, not many are willing to use them except for the few — i.e. the early adopters. Wearables and Smart home appliances are very fashionable and trendy. It will quickly become obsolete or less trendy when new and better gadgets are introduced. Personally, I have invested in many such devices just for the sake of becoming one the early adopters even though I know that after a year, it will be an “old” gadget. But then again, there are not many people like me.

Enterprise IOT applications are still lacking. These devices are not as trendy and fashionable like their consumer’s counterparts. Sensors that are being used in enterprises will last longer — maybe 3–5 years or even more. They are more robust and sometimes well-hidden somewhere. Thus, there is no need for some fancy design to house the sensors. However, these sensors can be more expensive, and when we talk about hundreds or thousands of sensors, the cost of deployment can become very prohibitive. To solve this, we need to have a win-win business model for both the IOT vendor and user.

Another “unspoken challenge” is the “resistance from within the company” itself. I have already described this in my previous post. Check — “Don’t let this ONE reason STOP you from implementing IOT”.

What other challenges or frustrations of IOT companies in doing business in Malaysia? Or are we facing similar problems elsewhere too? Why are we hearing a lot more success stories in developed countries such as Japan, Korea, USA, Spain, UK etc? Why not in our home country?

Or simply, most people JUST DON’T KNOW where to start their IOT journey?

[Similar article “IOT Adoption Challenges in Malaysia” published in IOT World]