Is India Well Positioned To Lead The IoT Space?

Almost a year back I wrote an article about Internet of Things ( IoT ) specific to India and explained why it is an unmissable growth opportunity for India. If I look at what has gone into IoT space in India in the last one year — things are not very promising.

Last week only, IOT India Congress that just happened in Bangalore, India — aimed to bring the IoT practitioners (hardware — devices, portables, sensors, software, business) and IoT enablers (regulatory, training, investors in IoT, end users) to work together and create a platform that is industry efficient as well as robust

Keynote speaker Sanjay Brahmawar, Global Head of BD at IBM Watson Internet of Things — explained it well along with a few examples

Union Minister for Electronics and IT Ravi Shankar Prasad, was giving a video address said that IoT was likely to generate economic benefits of almost $2 trillion to India. “We are sitting on the cusp of a big revolution,” he said

Is India Really Well Positioned For IoT?

Events like these have some value only if they result in some progress. Do we know adoption rates of IoT in India? Is India really positioned to win this race?

How many warehouse owners, product distributors and shipment companies are using IoT to track their fleet, products and services real-time and providing benefits to their consumers

Where are those hospitals in India that use IoT connected medical equipment? A Recentarticle on Entrepreneur India talked about many startups working on asset tracking, wearables, digital signage and traffic monitoring, which are fundamentally app-based models.

CXOtoday recent article also says that IoT would touch all aspects of human life and Internet of Things (IoT) presents big opportunities for Indian Smart Cities. CEOs have talked about visions and opportunities.

There are 13 Indian startups ( not a long list ) that are IoT specific working in all areas like agriculture, automobiles, consumer goods, energy and emergency management systems.

If you want to track progress on India based IoT products and startups Youstory.in is a good place to start with

Some Threats

There are few threats as well. Internet of Things ( IoT ) enables automation in a big way that leads to technological unemployment ( Job loss ). Securing IoT network and devices are another big issues. India has IT advantage because of large IT workforce but IT required to support IoT is different.

Though policy makers like NASSCOM have created IoT frameworks and COE to enable and drive the various initiatives by leveraging, academia, industry, government and Professional connects to democratize innovation in the IoT, but there is hardly any marketplace for enterprise or consumer IoT products or services

Recent Progress and IoT Market In India

Qualcomm is bullish about IoT adoption in India and their goals for India is very clear. Being the largest patent holders in the IoT space, that is a positive statement for IoT progress in India.

They have partnered with Phillips and Cisco for many projects in India and some are for Smart Cities in India. Qualcomm is also mentoring 10 Indian hardware startups for a chance to prototype their innovative tech products and win $100,000 in funding.

India could be seen as a prominent outsourcing destination for the internet of things (IoT) related services

As the global IoT business is expected to touch $300 billion by 2020, India aims to capture 20% market share in another five years, but Will that happen?

Source: LinkedIn Blog , For More Articles Read My LinkedIn Blogs