3 key challenges to enterprise IoT deployment

Heralded for driving the digital transformation across many industries including consumer products, retailing, manufacturing and more, the Internet of Things (IoT) promises to smarten up the world of business.

In a nutshell, enterprise IoT comprises of connected devices which collect data, analyze the data, and then generate insights used to transform processes and realize the benefits.

This sounds pretty simple, right?

Actually, the deployment of IoT in the enterprise can be very challenging. It’s not only the IT department that has to be involved in order for the effective implementation of IoT, but multiple operation teams across the business.

Here are three key challenges which must be considered and addressed for successful IoT implementation in the enterprise.

1. Understanding the data

As more devices and systems become connected, the larger the data sets needed to be processed will become.

For businesses, this will be likely to lead to a complexity issue, where the influx of large amounts of data could be overwhelming for them.

Within this large amount of data, it will be difficult to track truly valuable information. people will need to decide which data are important and will be worth the cost and effort involved in working with it.

In order to do this, a high-performance analytics platform is needed that has the capability to handle large amounts of data, extracting the most value.

2. Data security

With the increasing rise of cyber-attacks recently, businesses and customers are apprehensive about data security. IoT has already turned into a pretty serious security concern, drawing the attention of large tech firms and government agencies across the globe.

With the number of IoT endpoints set to from from 8.4 billion in 2017 to 20.4 billion by 2020, this is creating an attack surface on a scale never seen before.

The rising number of nodes being added to networks will only open up more possibilities for which hackers to carry out their deeds.

There seems to be many reasons contributing to the state on insecurity in IoT. But much of it can be attributed to the industry being in its “gold rush” state, where manufacturers and vendors are in a race to put to market the next innovative connected product.

In such cases, however, functionality becomes the main focus while security takes the back seat.

3. Incorrect data capture

Another challenge of IoT deployment is the problem of devices or sensors capturing incorrect data, sending false readings to the system.

This can be the result of a number of issues such as a bug in the software, a low battery, or a device failure. And in many cases, human error is the culprit, with wrong settings disrupting what the device generates.

While not an external security threat, the impact of these “rogue” devices can be just as harmful. For example, in a warehouse, sending incorrect data can hinder inventory management, which can result in increased costs.

Many businesses are beginning to understand the true opportunities that can be unlocked with IoT.

However, it is crucial for enterprises to first learn about the challenges of IoT adoption. As they start to adapt to this technology, they will need to know what problems they may face and how to overcome them.