Before the term was coined in 1999, the ‘Internet of Things’ has been an ever-growing presence in houses, workplaces, and across our towns and cities. How many devices are there around you at this very moment that are communicating with each other via wifi, Bluetooth, mobile networks, 2G, 3G and 4G? Phones, Tablets, and computers are easy to spot, but what about the GPS in your car, your TV’s internet connection, your Granddad’s heart monitor, or the smart-enabled egg shelf in your fridge that texts you when the expiry date arrives?
Alright so that last one might seem like a stretch, but if current technology forecasts are anything to go by then it won’t be long until household appliances sending you messages becomes an everyday occurrence. A Tony Stark-esque house with an AI connected to every machine in your house might be coming sooner than you think. Smart fridges, washing machines, and kettles might not be the most glamourous leaps in technology, but they are all part of escalating build-up of the smart home and smart city that rely on independent Machine to Machine communication to make our lives just that little bit easier.
I recently attended a talk on the way that the Internet of Things (IoT) is expanding exponentially, and some of the issues and trends that are affecting this growth, and it looks as though the civilian world is set for communication-equipped traffic controls and household appliances in abundance. The industrial applications of the IoT is one area where there is real potential for leaps and bounds, with innovations like Google Glass allowing companies to save money and time on travel, by creating remote solutions to problems by seeing through their workers’ eyes whilst using a central computer to identify the problem as reported by the machine itself.
Another area of enormous potential for IoT is in the medical field, where doctors can perform surgeries with built-in zoom functions in their goggles, nurses could monitor their patients’ vitals from miles away without invasive examinations, and patients could be reminded to take their medication by their GP (the GP being alerted via a smart-lid on the pill bottle, which trips an alert when not opened at the right time). The ramifications for smart machines in Medicine could revolutionise home-care and the standard of life for those with long-term medical conditions. The problem with both the industrial and medical applications of these potentially life-changing technical advancements, is that it is immensely difficult to ensure a secure network to prevent hackers, or just data-hungry companies looking for new customers, from intercepting data transfers and taking sensitive information about medical conditions or production methods.
The result of the long (long, long, long, long, long…) discussion about security threats, is that we are left with the slow crawl of nigh-on useless smart-appliances that can’t tell anyone anything more risqué than how often you wash your bed sheets (And yet even your washing machine is at risk of being used to complement DDoS attacks by industrious hackers).
Even with this delay to the industry, the IoT is set to create 4.5 million roles for developers by 2020 (for networks, software, wearable tech etc.) and has created new roles like Counter-hackers, Cloud Specialists and even the ‘E-Discovery Specialists’ that identify and prepare electronic evidence like smartphones for civil litigation and criminal investigation. Outside of the jobs that the IoT is directly creating, it is hard to think of any role in Technology that will not be affected by the rise of the IoT.
App development has been dominated by smart phones and tablets in recent years, but this area of the industry is set to have a massive boost thanks to the need for applications not only for connecting your phone to your fridge, but also for communications and user interface in each of the 25 billion estimated smart devices set to be in use by 2020.
So, for now, the industry is slowed by the naysayers, and I will have to settle for using a smart-watch to boil the kettle without getting off the sofa, but already the IoT is shaping the technical job market, and will only continue to do so as it gathers speed and support. But just you wait, the eggs go off tomorrow, so at least the fridge and I will stay connected.
If you’re interested in hearing about some of the roles that we’re working on that include links to the internet of things, please do contact the Futureboard team on +44 (0) 203 179 4500 for more information.
Charlie Wood, Futureboard