What is Enterprise Internet of Things (IoT)?

Posted at 08 Dec 2022 - 10 min read

1. What is IoT?

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a network of physical objects embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies for data connection and sharing with other devices and systems over the Internet. The Internet of Things technology is based on the logic that the goods or objects we use in our daily life exchange data with each other over the internet connection. Objects that are part of the system collect data from other units with the help of the sensors on them. Then, it transfers its data to other devices with systems such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. In this way, an internet-like network structure emerges. The technology that emerged with the internet of things has been used more and more actively with each passing day to meet both industrial and personal needs.

2. What is Enterprise IoT?

Enterprise IoT can be defined as the next phase of the Internet of Things concept. It is used to enable businesses to establish more connections, thereby increasing usage, reducing manual work, scaling business processes, and better planning, thus increasing operational efficiency, reducing operating costs, and becoming more efficient. That’s why more and more entrepreneurs are investing in connected physical products with embedded computing devices.

Enterprise Internet of Things can also be used to provide a better customer experience and to get more detailed large datasets to analyze. There are many ways that enterprise IoT can be applied to make daily business processes and employees more productive and efficient. It can be said that the possibilities offered by the IoT to businesses are almost unlimited and in line with their needs.

Leveraging a combination of technologies including embedded devices with sensors and actuators, internet-based communications, and cloud platforms, enterprise IoT applications can automate business processes dependent on contextual information provided by programmed devices such as machines, vehicles, intelligent devices, and other equipment. In addition, such enterprise IoT applications can also send control instructions to these devices based on certain business rules.

By connecting physical objects to the Internet with enterprise IoT investments, organizations can collect and transmit real-time data that they can use to make smarter business decisions and deliver more value to their customers. For example, a healthcare company can use IoT devices to track medical assets and monitor nurses to reduce operational burden. In addition, by remotely monitoring facility personnel, healthcare companies can quickly determine the location of their staff in real-time and track their daily activities & movement. Also, with IPERA’s cloud-based Wi-Fi & IoT software platform, you can use IoT devices for child tracking or employee tracking. By using IPERA, you can get live tracking by seeing historical logs. Thus, you can empower your venue app & enhance your visitor experience with Indoor IoT Solutions. From a single vendor like IPERA, you can get multiple enterprise use cases for indoor IoT services. IPERA’s IoT Platform also supports data collection, device communication, and all decision-making activities. Day after day, IoT systems are used extensively in many indoor areas for tracking and monitoring and has been continued to be used.

3. How Does IoT Work?

An IoT ecosystem consists of web-enabled smart devices that use embedded processors, sensors, and communication hardware to collect, send, and act upon data from the environment. IoT devices share the data they collect from sensors by connecting to another device where it is sent to the cloud for analysis or analysis locally. Sometimes, these devices communicate with other related devices and act based on the information they receive from each other. Devices in the ecosystem can work without human intervention; at the same time, people can interact with the devices. For example, setting up devices, instructing the system, or accessing data. An IoT system operates on real-time data collection and data exchange. An IoT system has three components:

Smart devices: They are devices such as television, security camera, and exercise equipment, which have been given the ability to process.

IoT application: It is a set of services and software that integrates data from various IoT devices. This application uses machine learning or artificial intelligence (AI) technology to analyze data and make informed decisions.

A graphical user interface: A mobile app or website that can be used to enroll and control smart devices is a common example.

4. What are the Differences Between IoT for Enterprises and Regular IoT?

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a term that refers to physical objects such as computers, mobile phones, home appliances, and many other electronic devices embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies. For example, we can think of mobile phones, sensors, smartwatches, and air conditioners. We can think of Retractable BLE Wearable, Retractable BLE Asset Tags, Environment, Occupancy & Presence Sensors for common applications.

IoT for enterprises is defined as using the Internet of Things in sector applications. It refers to interconnected sensors and other networked devices. Let’s take Amazon warehouse, smart robots, and Airbus as examples.

5. What Are the Pros and Cons of IoT?

We can list the advantages of IoT as follows:

It can help smarter control of homes and cities through mobile phones.
Increases security and provides personal protection.
It saves us a lot of time by automating activities.
It detects any potential danger and warns users, so it is useful for security.
IoT devices connect and communicate with each other and minimize human effort as it performs various tasks without the need for humans.

We can list the disadvantages of IoT as follows:

Hackers can access the system and steal personal information. Because we add too many devices and personal data to the Internet, we risk our information being misused.
People rely heavily on the Internet and cannot work effectively without the Internet.
The overuse of the internet and technology is making people stupid and lazy as they rely on smart devices instead of doing physical work.
Deploying IoT devices are very costly and time-consuming.
These devices will completely control our lives and depend on technology.

6. What Are the Top Enterprise Use Cases of IoT Devices and Systems?

As more and more leading organizations make significant investments in the IoT space, the corporate IoT domain is beginning to spread.

6.1. IoT in Healthcare

There are already several vital use cases for IoT in healthcare. Hospitals and practices increasingly use connected sensors to improve employees’ productivity, enhance the guest experience, and ensure employee safety. Monitor personnel remotely, know the location of your staff in real-time, and track their daily activities & movement wherever they are. In real-time, remote patient monitoring systems know who needs help and their exact location.

IoT is also used to increase the efficiency of hospitals; for example, it ensures patients are attended to regularly by monitoring nurses’ regular visits thanks to the housekeeping panic button. Also, you can monitor toilets, gyms, and facilities’ cleanliness.

6.2. Smart Cities

Smart city technology is any IoT hardware or software system designed to make a city run more efficiently. A smart city initiative must improve a city’s operations, save money, continuously improve citizens’ quality of life and make people comfortable. For example, traffic lights and cameras connected to the IoT will be able to detect that there are too many cars at an intersection and automatically adjust the signal timing to improve the flow. Emergency vehicles will communicate directly with the connected traffic infrastructure, even from other cities, allowing you to report dangers or accidents on the road when you are stuck in traffic.

6.3. Public transport

Self-driving cars and autonomous public transport are examples of rapidly developing and used IoT initiatives. Connected vehicles are predicted to offer a more efficient and safe transportation system. Public transport fleets such as buses, taxis, delivery vans, freight trains, and subways will soon be able to communicate with each other, traffic signals, and infrastructure to avoid congestion, reduce accidents and save energy by regulating speed.

6.4. Real Estate – Smart Security

The Internet of Things has an impact that could revolutionize our entire infrastructure, including real estate. Just as smart homes are transforming consumer technology, they will transform security. Using the latest wireless technology, a home can detect intruders and notify residents if any windows or doors are open while they are out. This will help reduce crime rates and make people feel safe at home. It could also lead to new insurance policies for homeowners who can get a discount on their premiums by installing smart security systems.

6.5. Manufacturing

Factories utilize IoT devices to monitor production flow in real-time, optimizing material usage to eliminate waste and unnecessary work in processing inventory. Outfitting machines with IoT monitoring devices allows facility managers to monitor and manage equipment remotely. These monitoring devices can even be configured to send alerts when certain conditions are met to eliminate machine downtime, increase throughput, conserve energy and reduce costs.

7. What Technologies Have Made the IoT Possible?

The first application of the IoT took place in 1969 when the first bank withdrawal ATM was launched. Eventually, the concept became popular, and the internet of things became what it is today over the years. The Internet of Things is so widespread and used because of the complementary advances in hardware and software technologies and the constant change and evolution of human needs. IoT refers to the increasing number of devices connected to the global Internet. The convergence of some technology trends, especially recently, has made IoT possible:

The development of operating systems and protocols with a small footprint is one of the aspects that led to the development of IoT. Hardware requirements for lightweight versions of mainstream operating systems such as Windows and Linux have remained stable or dropped as the performance of embedded platforms has improved.

Wireless communication is very advanced nowadays. The acceleration of WiFi with each new addition to protocols has allowed the expansion of connectivity options for low-power devices in the industrial and consumer electronics markets.

Various types of sensors play an important role in IoT. As low-power and low-cost sensor technologies become readily available, IoT engineering services have become significantly easier.

A major reason that has helped the concept of IoT grow is the development of cloud computing platforms. These platforms allow businesses and consumers to take full advantage of their IoT infrastructure without having to manage it.

These trends have made the IoT possible by making it possible for everything to transmit data to or be controlled from the Internet at very little additional cost to our basic device.

Mac Randomization and Impact for Physical Spaces

Posted at 26 Sep 2020 - 7 min read

During the summer of 2020 Apple announced an important update as part of the release of iOS 14 and watchOS 7. Initially Apple was intending to change the MAC address every 24 hours, and avoiding Wireless Network SSIDs to remember devices, therefore preventing SSIDs to track and profile users over time and recognize repeat customers. This caused a shock across the WiFi community, Network operators as well as companies rely on MAC address based operations and customer experience. Apple likely received pressure from industry players to change its position and announced that it will not randomize MAC address every 24 hours. Instead, the randomized private MAC address will remain the same when a device connects to the same network SSID that it was previously connected. Therefore the SSIDs will be able to remember guests during their next visits

How does Apple’s randomize MAC address with iOS14 and watchOS7

MAC is short for media access control, a unique identifier for each electronic wireless device that connects to Wi-Fi network. Each hardware chip has a static Hardware MAC address, which is used for various purposes in Wireless industry by Network Operators as well as enterprises / companies / physical spaces / homes. Some examples of use of hardware MAC address includes parental control, MAC authentication at workplaces, recognition of repeat guests and visitors for physical spaces

IPERA, its channel partners and customers have used the static MAC address to make the WiFi experience more convenient for guests, recognizing repeat customers to provide them better and frictionless Wi-Fi experience. Previously connected visitors and customers are recognized whenever they visit the same location again, and they won’t need to re-enter their login credentials each time they visit. Credentials are remembered, and they are automatically signed in to the network with a welcome message. This function is called Smart Login on IPERA Starling platform and MAC address is used to detect repeat customers.

Another benefit that companies gain from static MAC address is to understand customers behavioral insights such as visit patterns, dwell time, presence, etc. for better customer communication and tailored offers at the right moment. A repeat visitor or loyal shoppers could receive a welcome back text message including a contextual targeted special offer at their arrival at the store.

In short, a static MAC address made it easy for companies with physical locations to market and get to know more about their guests and visitors. This is the reason why WiFi industry has grown to be a critical part of modern marketing. However, having a static MAC address has grown concerns around customer privacy. Many customers feel that they don’t have control over their own data, and they don’t have clue about how their data is uses when they consume a mobile app or an online service. Therefore, privacy has become a concern for enterprises like Apple, and it has been a while now Apple is trying to improve the consumer privacy. Here is the latest article around this topic on Apple website.

From Apple website:

To communicate with a Wi-Fi network, a device must identify itself to the network using a unique network address called a media access control (MAC) address. If the device always uses the same Wi-Fi MAC address across all networks, network operators and other network observers can more easily relate that address to the device’s network activity and location over time. This allows a kind of user tracking or profiling, and it applies to all devices on all Wi-Fi networks.

To reduce this privacy risk, iOS 14, iPadOS 14, and watchOS 7 use a different MAC address for each Wi-Fi network. This unique, static MAC address is your device’s private Wi-Fi address for that network only.

Similarly, Android and Microsoft operating systems are also adopting the Privacy approach.

There are three impacts of the MAC Randomization for the Wi-Fi Analytics firms and physical spaces

Lack of Guest Recognition Across Multiple Locations & Wi-Fi Networks

Captive portals are web pages presented to users during initial network connection, typically for guest networks. They’re used to deliver legal terms and agreements, for guest/visitor login, to capture some guest info in exchange for connectivity, and for authentication/billing purposes, such as usage-based hotspots. In many cases, captive web portals use the MAC address as the device anchor, and so the user’s authorization state is connected to the MAC. If the MAC ever changes, the infrastructure will force the user through the portal again, creating a user-experience challenge.

The good news is that an individual location WiFi network is not affected. After upgrading to iOS14, a user’s device will have to reconnect again using credentials. However, during the following visits, their mobile device will have the same private MAC address, and it will be automatically connected.

However, for companies having multiple locations, multiple brands, multiple wi-fi networks and multiple SSIDs will face the issue of MAC randomization, because each network will have a different private MAC address. As an example, if a holding company runs several different brands / stores, not having a static MAC address would make it difficult for each brand to offer a smooth and overall guest WiFi experience — even if they’re all owned by the same company.

Reason is that, Guest Wi-Fi management solutions rely on MAC address to recognize a repeat guest. With the new MAC Randomization, a private MAC address is generated by mobile device for each SSID. The location’s WiFi network won’t be able to recognize a returning guest even if they’ve been to the company’s other locations in the past or have shopped the brands that are owned by the same company.

Visitor Journey Across Multiple Locations

Companies will still have visibility on wi-fi location analytics & insights for an individual location. They will be able to see customer footfall / density and heatmap data as well as customer flow & path analytics in venues like airports, shopping malls, theme parks, etc.. However, they won’t have the ability to build a history of guest activity across various locations and brands — owned by the same company— so they will no longer be able to build an entire brand journey using their MAC address.

Contextual Targeted & Tailored Customer Communication

Building customer communication strategies based on Wi-Fi location analytics is one of the key components of the modern Guest Wi-Fi system for physical spaces. Instead of bulk marketing, digital marketing teams build tailored communication strategies which benefits both venue operators and consumers. MAC Randomization plays a great role to understand repeat visitors. For an individual location, it will be possible to understand the behavior and segment customers based on their visit patterns & behavior. However, if multiple locations use multiple Guest Wi-Fi networks or SSIDs, even owned by the same company, connecting with guests based on their previous activities in multiple locations or across multiple brands — owned by the same company— won’t be possible anymore.

The way forward for frictionless guest experience

It is clear that MAC randomization story will not end here, with iOS14. There was a push back from Apple to minimize impact on operations for network operators. However, it is clear that the industry is heading to more strict policies. It’s time to protect privacy and, at the same time, redesign the Guest WiFi experience in the most seamless way.

IPERA has been taking steps to implement privacy functionality part of Starling Guest Experience & Analytics portal. At the same time, IPERA enables companies to power their Guest WiFi and get the most benefit from their investment

IPERA is building alternatives for companies to continue providing frictionless & seamless Wi-Fi experience. At the same time they collect customers personal data while respecting their privacy, yet providing greater value to their guests.

Contact IPERA today and request a demo to see IPERA Starling platform in action. Empower your Guest WiFi experience and transform Guest WiFi into business opportunities that generates value for your business