Clearing the Air: 5 IIoT Myths/Facts on IIoT solutions for Manufacturing

Over the past few years, Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) has been increasingly advancing across all industries. Business investments in IIoT solutions are now on the increase and will reach over 830 billion dollars by 2020, according to a forecast report by Forbes Magazine. The report also indicates that manufacturing, logistics and transportation industries will be on the frontline of IIoT spending with each averaging at 40 billion dollars.

Nevertheless, there are many misconceptions regarding IIoT benefits and its implementation across Manufacturing industry. Upon accepting such notions as true, these companies, can truly miss out the IIoT transformational power and its ability to enable operational efficiency, creation of new business models, value propositions and markets. To ensure that manufacturing companies are able to tap into the full IIoT potential, it is important to separate propaganda from the reality. With the expertise in solving real-world problems for manufacturing clients and providing Industrial IoT services to them, our consultants have identified few IIoT myths and also separated them from IIoT facts in this article.

Misconception 1. IIoT is only for large Manufacturing organizations

Fact: IIoT is applicable for organizations of any size

Many small and medium sized companies tend to think that IIoT is only for the large enterprises. The wrong thinking mostly stems from things like small companies may not have enough data, capital and other resources to deploy IIoT. But the reality is that organizations of any size can implement IIoT solutions. IoT Consulting services, such as Azure IoT, make it possible for both small and large sized companies to build IoT solutions without the need for dedicated IT teams or comprehensive IoT infrastructure.

Misconception 2: IIoT can never be secure

Fact: IoT can be safe and secure.

Owing to many instances about IIoT devices insecurity in the news lately, manufacturing companies think there’s no way to effectively secure the technology. Luckily, many enterprises, security vendors, startups and device manufacturers are already in the business of prioritizing IIoT security. Additionally, security standards bodies are energetically developing IIoT security procedures and frameworks to ascertain IIoT safety. By collaborating and working in close partnership with hardware manufacturers and IIoT solution providers, it is possible to design & create secure IoT devices and ensure secure data transmission between devices. For manufacturing companies, managed security processes & procedures provide value for manufacturing applications and assists in reducing threats that can pose risk for cloud data migration.

Misconception 3: IIoT is only about device connections

Fact: IoT is all about generating actionable data

Connecting many devices is the only way to capture the device data. It is true that there involves many device connections in a manufacturing plant and it is the building block or foundation of IIoT. However, the value results from the generated real-time data streams that can enable actionable insights for improved decision making. Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can use the actionable insights to set preventative maintenance schedules, predict outcomes and prevent asset & operation failures to better optimize system uptime.

Misconception 4: Manufacturing industries don’t need IIoT

Fact: IIoT implementation helps gain business insights that increase business productivity and operational efficiency

It is such a great misapprehension to even begin to think that manufacturing industries don’t require IIoT. Contrariwise, it is this very sector that needs this technology the most. Because many manufacturing procedures and processes are not necessarily on the same premises, connecting them together not only provides actionable data insights for increased efficiency and productivity, but fosters great management levels, resource and equipment tracking and employee safety.

Misconception 5: IIoT implementation for manufacturing involves huge costs

Fact: IIoT enables companies to build new revenue streams in the long run

One of the biggest myth a manufacturing company can take hold of is that IIoT is costly. The fact is that it is not when looked at in a clear view and angle. It is true that investments including IIoT will require financial resources, but that is only half the story. The other half truth is that after IIoT implementation, the actionable insights harvested from IIoT solutions ultimately reduce costs for either production or marketing; thereby increases efficiency and productivity. The result is less expenses and more growth which boosts profits.

Pre-configured IoT solutions such as Azure IoT Central & Azure IoT suite, and open-source software enables manufacturing companies to deploy IoT solutions easily; without having to use dedicated engineering/IT teams or create IoT infrastructures.

This article also appeared on TechTarget IoT Agenda, which provides enterprise businesses with the latest Internet of Thins (IoT) news and blogs, covering platforms, technologies, and strategies. Read the published post here.