Industry experts discuss growth strategies at IoT Summit

Last week, experts in the Internet of Things congregated at the GSMA’s IoT Summit at Mobile World Congress Shanghai, to discuss how to make the most of the emerging IoT opportunity. Its enormous potential is already apparent, but as it develops, new and unforeseen challenges will arise that could inhibit growth and prevent it from reaching scale. In an effort to ensure its rapid growth, the GSMA is working with operators to help create an IoT that is ripe with opportunity for all stakeholders. The Summit was an extension of this, and a rare occasion in which the industry’s principal innovators gathered to share objectives and strategies in the development of the IoT.
The event was attended by over 500 people and included speakers from a wide range of high profile organisations across the IoT ecosystem such as: NTT DoCoMo, Accenture Digital, APNIC, Ericsson, F5, Giesecke & Devrient, Huawei, Infineon Qualcomm, Samsung, Sierra Wireless, Virtue intelligent Network, Thin Film, Wireless Broadband Alliance and the GSMA. Experts addressed the fundamental issues that will dictate the nature of the IoT’s development such as Low Power Wide Area solutions (LPWA), network security and the central role of operators.
Trends
Speakers were uniformly positive about the growth of the IoT – Industry projections estimate that there will be 50 billion connected devices worldwide by 2020 – or 7 devices for every person on earth. As the IoT grows, mobile will have an increasingly central role to play, acting as hub and management platform for a multiplicity of devices. What’s more is that the number of people using mobile phones is rapidly increasing. In the same period of time, there will be 9.2 mobile subscriptions and 90% of the world’s population over 6 years old will own a mobile phone.
Connectivity & Low Power Wide Area solutions
A central theme of the Summit was the crucial role of operators – by virtue of being able to provide wide area connectivity, operators are essential in enabling the IoT to scale. Yet operators are also increasingly cooperating with wireless broadband providers in order to provide seamless interoperability that will enable users to move across different connections seamlessly. The combination of low-power Wi-Fi solutions with mobile connectivity could potentially provide significant cost savings and improve scalability.
Operators will also be essential in providing connectivity for LPWA solutions. As the IoT scales, there will be an increasing amount devices that use very little power, but perform vital functions nonetheless. Network operators are best placed to manage a full range of IoT solutions through a range of radio networks.
Security
As the IoT develops, and more devices are connected, the issue of security will only increase in importance. Speakers were convinced that the security of connected devices in a scalable network depends on all stakeholders following a unified approach. Here, operators were also deemed to have a central role, having established themselves as the trusted, licensed provider of secure IoT solutions, they can help ensure the long term sustainability and growth of the market.
Dr. Shane Rooney, Executive Director, Connected Living, GSMA, spoke at length about the measures that the GSMA and its members are taking to make sure the IoT develops securely, including the development of a Fraud and Security working group operating as well as building upon the recommendations contained in the GSMA’s “End-to-End Security for M2M & IOT” whitepaper. The GSMA is also developing a public set of IoT Security Guidelines for industry use.

Download presentations from the event

 
Graham Trickey, Head of Connected Living programme, GSMA
Low Power Wide Area Solutions – The central role of the Operator and how to fit with other radio technologies
Bob Cai, President of FDD LTE Product Line, Huawei
Jonas Näslund, VP, Head of Radio Strategy, Ericsson
Way-Shing Lee, VP of Technology, Qualcomm Technologies
The importance of security in our networks and the need to have an approved set of security guidelines adapted for IoT
Shane Rooney, Executive Director, CLP, GSMA
Juergen Spaenkuch, Division VP Chip Card & Security, Infineon Technologies
Geoff Petersen, Solution Architect, Service Provider Security, F5 Networks
Scaling the IoT – Deploying More Devices and Services with Remote SIM provisioning
Naoki Tani, Managing Director of M2M Business Department, NTT DoCoMo
Klaus Vedder, Group Senior Vice President, Giesecke & Devrient
Gary Waite, Executive Director – Embedded SIM, GSMA
Industrial Trend and Future IoT Developmen
Gareth Davies, PR Director Marketing & Communication, GSMA M2M IoT Report
Paul Wilson, Director General, APNIC
Innovative Technology in IoT evolution
Qiming Yin, Vice President, Virtue intelligent Network
Jin Wook Lee, Vice President, Samsung
Kai Leppänen, Chief Commercial Officer, Thin film
IoT Case Studies in different Industries
David Buhan, Senior Vice President, Managing Mobile Subscriber Services, Gemalto
Sam Huang, Vice President of Cisco China
Neil Hickey, Managing Director, Mobility Lead, Greater China, Accenture Digital
Helen Xu, Senior Director and head of China Automotive, Infineon
Ton Brand, Senior Director, Wireless Broadband Alliance
Colin Chew, Director, Business Management, Asia (excl. JP & IN), OEM Solutions, Sierra Wireless