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24 October 2024
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IoT Capability Must Keep Pace with Adopters’ Ambitions
What's the state and scale of IoT adoption in the UK and US?
Eseye
IoT Hardware and Connectivity Specialists
LinkedInIoT adoption in the UK and US continues to ramp up, with companies in both markets reporting significant benefits from their projects. However, the findings of Eseye’s fourth annual State of IoT Adoption survey suggests they may struggle to sustain momentum.
Of the organizations surveyed, 80% plan to scale up their IoT estates within the next 18 months. Almost one third plan to double the size of their device deployments. Looking at spend, nearly three quarters of respondents (74%) expect to increase their investment in the next two years, with more than half (54%) anticipating a budget boost of between 25%-50%.
This resolve to build on their IoT investments indicates that, overall, initiatives are delivering the required goals and outcomes. The leading benefit reported in 2024 is increased revenue (63%), the same as last year, while 57% cite the contribution IoT has made to their sustainability goals as a major advantage. Sustainability considerations have risen to the top of the agenda this year: 94% of respondents say this is important when designing an IoT device.
Limitations at both the network and device level are threatening future success, however.
Connectivity concerns linger
Despite 79% of businesses stating that achieving close to 100% global connectivity is crucial to their business case, their ability to materialize this is waning. Connectivity levels have worsened year-on-year: less than half a percent of companies are getting more than 98% average uptime across their deployments, even lower than last year’s 1.5%.
Achieving reliable device connectivity across multiple countries, regions or location is another pressing issue, with 22% having to overcome this in 2024. Almost three quarters of organizations agree that needing to manage multiple SIMs and platforms from different providers is time-consuming.
Meanwhile, 58% of respondents attribute most of their IoT project failures to issues with the device. For 26%, security is the greatest challenge they face – and half admit that their business has suffered an IoT security breach in the past 12 months.
US companies are more ambitious
Zooming in to compare responses from the US and UK, we see that 85% of IoT leaders in the US plan to expand their estates within the coming 18 months, versus 75% in the UK. This represents a rise of 2% and drop of 4%, respectively.
These intentions are echoed in our respondents’ investment plans, with 79% of US businesses expecting to increase their budgets in the next two years – 13% meaning to increase their spend by 51-100% – versus 69% in the UK.
The primary benefit delivered by IoT projects is the same for both markets – increased revenue – although more US companies (67%) accomplished this than their UK counterparts (59%). There is another significant gap on the contribution IoT has made to sustainability goals, with 62% of US respondents leveraging this benefit compared with 52% in the UK.
The main hurdles faced in each market differ. The biggest barrier to IoT success reported by UK businesses is device security (30%), while in the US it is accessing technical IoT support (29%). More IoT adopters in the US are struggling with device problems than those in the UK, with 64% blaming project failures on issues with their devices, in contrast with 52% in the UK.
Reflecting the top line trend, the percentage of respondents in each market achieving more than 98% connectivity is minuscule: only 0.5% in the US and 0.3% in the UK. Almost a quarter of UK businesses (21%) are trying to get by with device availability of just 70-80%, compared with 15% in the US.
The top IoT priorities
Looking forward to the factors that will drive future IoT success, our survey uncovered high demand for capabilities that allow data to be processed at the edge. The majority (80%) of businesses are keen to use on-device intelligence to optimize performance.
Managed services are also increasingly critical: 77% of organizations prefer to work with a managed IoT connectivity service provider, and 89% would find working with a partner with end-to-end IoT services under one roof beneficial. However, 62% are struggling to find a partner that possesses this expertise.
Despite powerful evidence that the impetus to expand IoT estates is continuing to grow, there are fundamental barriers that must still be overcome if initiatives are to deliver on their business case. Security and sustainability need to be embedded in device design, for instance, while greater control over connectivity and network flexibility are crucial to reverse the decline in average uptime.
Alongside addressing these ‘non negotiables’, IoT providers should also be aware of what matters most to businesses, and how this varies between different markets. Only by aligning their capabilities with these priorities will they be in a position to support the advancements that IoT leaders are clearly so eager to make.
Dive into the research
Discover the results of our largest State of IoT Adoption survey to date with insights into the challenges and opportunities that are hindering and helping IoT adoption IoT projects from 1,200 senior decision-makers in the UK and US.
Read report
Eseye
IoT Hardware and Connectivity Specialists
LinkedInEseye brings decades of end-to-end expertise to integrate and optimise IoT connectivity delivering near 100% uptime. From idea to implementation and beyond, we deliver lasting value from IoT. Nobody does IoT better.