Making IOT Work at the Edge with Satellite – Via Satellite –
The Internet of Things (IOT) is projected to be one of the biggest technology growth engines of all time. Forecasters estimate there will be up to 70 billion connected devices by 2020, far exceeding the number of broadband connections among human beings. It will be awesome.
How often have you read a paragraph like that? Quite a few times, I suspect. Whatever the technology under discussion today, the numbers are big, the potential is unlimited and the writer seems to be breathing very hard.
As a futurist recently reminded me, technology forecasts are generally worthless. Nobody knows how big or important the Internet of Things will be. Certainly, the potential is there. Properly implemented, IOT should be able to predict when machinery needs to be repaired and optimize production in factories. It should automate inventory management and monitor medical patients’ vitals. Your city may get smarter. So may your home and your car, and your phone will know what you want before you do.
For all of the heavy breathing, IOT is a lot like something familiar: automating a factory. We have been doing that for decades — combining sensors, mechanical systems and information processing to make things faster, cheaper and better than before. IOT is about busting out of the factory and taking these technologies on the road. That road may be a city street or a major highway. But it also will be in the middle of nowhere, or on the ocean waves, or up among the clouds. Much of the most economically critical IOT activity is going to take place at the edges of the network, and that is territory the satellite industry knows well.