December 8, 2014
Volume XLX, Issue 8
Join DCIA's IoT Marathon Webcast
 The DCIA encourages DCINFO readers to participate in production of the upcoming "DCIA's Internet of Things (IoT) in 2015" from January 6th through 9th at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
DCIA's IoT in 2015 will feature a marathon four-day webcast showcasing industry-leading developments in smart objects for fitness and healthcare; programmable homes and energy management; media entertainment and social networking solutions; geolocation services and vehicular automation; retail, public space and manufacturing environments; and power consumption, cybersecurity, and interoperability.
Recording of segments in HD-video for DCIA's IoT in 2015 is being scheduled during the 2015 International CES at the DCIA Exhibit Booth in the South Hall of the Convention Center.
CES delegates involved with connected consumer device innovations, wearable creations, machine-to-machine (M2M) advances, radio-frequency identification device (RFID) developments, remote monitoring and maintenance solutions, micro-sensor discoveries, trusted computing services, smart environment architectures, and related examples of the emerging IoT phenomenon are welcome to be included.
Industry analysts and observers are also invited to provide their perspectives and insights, including into the primary obstacles that must be overcome for IoT to reach its full potential.
If you'd like to contribute a segment to this webcast or participate in another way, please contact DCIA CEO Marty Lafferty at your earliest convenience.
IoT: What It Is and Why You Should Care
Excerpted from Lifehacker Report by Patrick Allen
 You've probably started to hear the term "Internet of Things (IoT)" being thrown around a lot lately.
If you're not sure what it means, don't worry, you're not alone. This video can help you understand.
The video from Linus at the Techquickie YouTube channel explains the basics of the "IoT," the name given to the interconnection of everyday devices from appliances in your home to automobiles with built-in sensors.
Essentially it is the way that machines communicate with each other in order to improve automation and efficiency in
daily tasks.
Basically all of your appliances, tools, and vehicles will be talking to each other. As time goes on, you'll start to see more and more Internet-connected devices.
The perks of this future include more ease and efficiency when it comes to our day-to-day lives, and it could even save lives with instant reporting from health monitoring systems.
This also means that manufacturers can update products and their functionality post-launch without you having to bring them to a store.
Of course, the more things we automate in our lives, the more problems can arise when something goes wrong. Whether it's something you want or not, it appears that the IoT is here to stay. Read more...
IoT to Bring a New Economic Boom
Excerpted from InfoWorld Report by Patrick Thibodeau
 The Internet of Things (IoT) may be more significant in reshaping the competitive landscape than the arrival of the Internet. Its productivity potential is so powerful it will deliver a new era of prosperity.
That's the argument put forth by Michael Porter, an economist at the Harvard Business School and James Heppelmann, President and CEO of PTC, in a recent Harvard Business Review essay. PTC is a product design software firm that recently acquired machine-to-machine (M2M) firm Axeda.
In the past 50 years, IT has delivered two major transformations or "waves," as the authors describe them. The first came in the 1960s and 1970s, with IT-enabled process automation, computer-aided design, and manufacturing resource planning. The second was the Internet and everything it delivered. The third is IoT.
With IoT, "IT is becoming an integral part of the product itself," wrote Porter and Heppelmann. It is doing this by infusing sensors, processors, and software in every product imaginable and coupling it with analytics. That combination will change how businesses operate, how they deliver their products, and how they interact with customers.
"Another leap in productivity in the economy will be unleashed by these new and better products," Porter and Heppelmann argue. "The third wave of IT-driven transformation thus has the potential to be the biggest yet, triggering even more innovation, productivity gains, and economic growth than the previous two."
That's a strikingly sweeping claim and there will no doubt be contrarians to Porter and Heppelmann's view. Read more...
Report from CEO Marty Lafferty
 The Distributed Computing Industry Association (DCIA) is pleased to announce our partnership with BroadGroup, an international consulting firm providing professional advisory services that include research, publishing, and special events designed to inspire information communities.
Based in London, England, BroadGroup's core practices center on data centers; cloud computing; carrier wholesale strategy; information technology (IT) and telecommunications regulation; IT infrastructure; and technology, media, and telecom (TMT) financing and investments.
BroadGroup's market leading portfolio of events already attracts over 4,000 of the highest level decision-making delegates from more than 50 countries worldwide.
Our initial joint endeavor will be the upcoming Datacloud South East Asia taking place from March 25th through 26th in Johor, Malaysia.
Datacloud South East Asia will assess the energy, scalability, security, architecture, and software challenges confronting operators of data centers and enterprises engaged in or considering transitions to the cloud.
Enterprises and third-party operators across South East Asian markets are in the process of migrating to cloud data centers, which are fast becoming the indispensable infrastructure for computing, storage, and management of big data.
Such organizations require simple and scalable ways to create interoperability among many siloed databases and endpoints, and must offer highly available, multi-tenant, elastic integration to support high-density computing.
Many challenges confront companies in adapting to cloud environments: adjusting data center parameters to cope with the new demands that cloud computing brings, determining how to drive greater energy efficiency, providing for data security in the cloud, and managing increased workforce use of smartphones and tablets, to name a few.
Moving applications to the cloud also raises fundamental concerns about service availability, manageability, and connectivity.
Workload migration among clouds is another key challenge when migrating to the hybrid cloud model, and some enterprises are moving part of their workload to a public cloud environment while retaining other workloads in a private cloud.
More South East Asia businesses are looking to outsource non-core services to the cloud in order to achieve cost savings in the value chain and yet benefits from cloud innovation, especially in the area of big data.
Datacloud is becoming the regional networking forum for end-users, operators, investors, and solutions providers focused on the data center and cloud sector.
The main objective of the event is to bring together stakeholders to assess current challenges and evaluate how data center and cloud technologies can drive competitive advantages for enterprises and generate new business opportunities.
The DCIA is pleased to offer speaking opportunities as well as complimentary VIP registrations to qualified parties, as well as sponsorship and exhibiting opportunities.
The venue for Datacloud South East Asia will be Traders Hotel, Puteri Harbor, Johor, Malaysia.
Traders Hotel is the top international hospitality brand in Nusajaya strategically positioned in the heart of a 688-acre waterfront precinct.
Part of our objective in this partnership is to help make Johor a new digital hub. Share wisely, and take care.
Key to IoT: Consumer Empowerment
Excerpted from Forbes Report by Jason Bloomberg
 The Internet of Things (IoT) may sound like the next great area of innovation to drive consumer convenience and capability — until the details sink in. Do we really want big companies dictating how we control our appliances, while collecting data about our behavior to sell us more stuff?
And do we truly crave refrigerators that order milk or cars that make their own service appointments? Sometimes it seems the hype around the IoT exceeds consumers' desire for the technology — not to mention the headaches that come along for the ride.
Not all IoT vendors, however, are flogging products offering questionable value propositions that run contrary to consumer preferences. "When we launch a product, we observe deeply to understand how people are using it, what are they using it for, and how they tweak it to suit their own needs," explains Ohad Zeira, Director of Product Management for WeMo at Belkin International. "Conversations with consumers are changing how marketing and product development works."
Belkin International is a Playa Vista, CA based manufacturer of consumer electronics. It specializes in networking and other connectivity devices, primarily for consumers and small businesses. While it's perhaps best known for its networking gear, its popular WeMo home automation line has given it an onramp to the IoT.
Home automation in some form has been around for years, giving consumers the ability to control when lights and appliances turn on-and-off. WeMo, however, presents a new opportunity, "the most approachable entry point into the connected home," as Zeira explains the strategy.
WeMo's essential realization was that customers aren't demanding sophisticated connected home capabilities. "People don't feel disconnected from their home and then go and get a connected home," Zeira says. Instead, WeMo is starting small. "We want to be there with the solution for a specific problem that really annoys a user, and build from there." Read more...
IoT to Revolutionize the IT Department
Excerpted from Datamation Report by Pedro Hernandez
 IT managers are in for big changes during the next few years as billions of connected devices light-up the Internet of Things (IoT), according to IDC.
The Framingham, MA based technology research firm published its IoT predictions for 2015 and they point to massive disruption in the data center market. Ninety percent of data center and enterprise systems-management environments are expected to switch to new business models to handle IoT and bring-your-own-devices (BYOD) by 2017. Forty percent of IoT data will be processed and stored at, or close to, the network edge by 2018.
IoT at the edge: By 2018, 40 percent of IoT-created data will be stored, processed, analyzed, and acted upon close to, or at the edge, of the network.
IDC also forecast that IoT will put the squeeze on IT networks. Fifty percent of networks will go from having plenty of capacity to being network constrained within three short years as they struggle to support IoT devices. Nearly 10 percent of networks will be overwhelmed, predicts IDC.
Cloud computing will help shoulder some of that burden. "Within the next five years, more than 90 percent of all IoT data will be hosted on service provider platforms," said IDC, due to the cloud's ability to streamline IoT "Data Blending."
As always, where there's data, there's the possibility of leaks.
IDC expects IoT-based security breaches to affect a whopping 90 percent of IT networks within two years. Read more...
Plan an IoT Architecture in the Data Center
Excerpted from TechTarget Report by Alan Earls
 The Internet of Things (IoT) is coming on full force, and IT has some work to do.
The fundamental idea of IoT is that connectivity is rapidly growing — via the Internet — to a wide range of embedded sensors, devices, and systems. IoT embraces existing machine-to-machine (M2M) communications and expands to include more analytics and consumer-oriented products.
By the end of 2020, there will be approximately 212 billion Internet-connected things, from healthcare instruments to tracking devices to wearables, according to analyst firm IDC in a report that forecasts a number more than four times the most bullish of other industry estimates.
And all of that new or expanded instrumentation generates traffic for networks and demand for storing and processing data, which is bound to mean more stress on server, storage, and networking infrastructures, said Nik Rouda, Senior Analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG).
Back-end systems — servers, storage, and networks — must grow into an IoT architecture to support the massive economic transition.
From an IT support perspective, the large number of small packets of data coming from multiple directions could cause chaos, said Ed Featherston, Director and Senior Enterprise Architect at Collaborative Consulting, an IT services provider based in Boston, MA. These small packets of data come from numerous devices, ultimately consuming corporate bandwidth.
Without proper planning, "IoT could overwhelm a corporate WAN or create bottlenecks at remote or hosted sites," said Featherston. Read more...
Storage Visions 2015 Registration Now Open
 The Fourteenth Annual Storage Visions Conference (SV 2015) includes a keynote speaker from Samsung Semiconductor who will discuss the impact of flash memory technology on tomorrow's data centers. The full conference agenda with speakers identified can be seen here. SV 2015 is a partner program at the 2015 CES, and early conference registration provides a free pass to the CES exhibits.
The 2015 Storage Visions Conference is pleased to feature a keynote talk by Zack Deiri, Senior Vice President of Business Development for Enterprise & Data Storage, at Samsung. His talk, entitled, "Storage: A Historic Shift in Data Center Thinking," is described below.
Today, data centers are being inundated with demands to accommodate a wealth of big data and an exponentially greater need to store large volumes of information for longer and longer periods of time. This growth is occurring in the midst of steady movement toward virtualization, cloud architecture, and software-defined networks (SDN).
We will review the latest advancements in flash-based SSD technology, including NVMe PCIe and V-NAND SSD technology, and how they will impact the future of storage design. We also will explore why Samsung is ahead of the curve in the historic shift in data center storage that is enabling much higher performing and more power-efficient storage than hard disk drives.
We will take a close look at why In-Memory computing is changing the entire memory industry thanks in large part to NAND flash. In-Memory computing is enabling the rise of real-time analytics, which is allowing businesses to begin to manage their day-to-day operations in real-time.
Conference registration is open until December 26th. Discount hotel registration is available until December 13th.
Five Trends That Will Drive Data Storage in 2015
Excerpted from eWeek Report by Darryl Taft
 From smartphones and laptops to YouTube and photo-sharing websites, today's always-on technology has sparked an explosion of data that differs from the data files handled by IT departments in the past.
Beyond databases, legal records, and more, organizations are now dealing with unstructured data, which is comprised of large file formats like audio files in banking, patent files in law firms, and human genomic codes in life sciences.
The data is vast, and growing. According to IDC, more than 90 percent of the world's data is unstructured.
This means we're moving from terabyte to petabyte to exabyte levels of data and higher.
In 2012, the amount of global data reached roughly 2.7 zettabytes — and IDC predicts that number will double again by 2015 and continue to double every two years after that.
Looking back at the past year, a number of steps were taken to address hyperscale data storage, including major improvements in utilization, cost savings, management, and more.
Data storage was prioritized by IT teams, but while large advancements were made, several challenges still need to be addressed in 2015.
According to Chris Gladwin, founder of object-based storage provider Cleversafe, the following five trends will drive the data storage industry in 2015.
First, hyper-scalability will be a growing priority. Increasing data storage server-by-server is no longer an option for IT teams. Read more...
Six Ways to Define Your IoT Strategy
Excerpted from Forbes Report by Frank Burkitt
 By 2020, an estimated 50 billion devices around the globe will be connected to the Internet. Perhaps a third of them will be computers, smartphones, tablets, and TVs. The remaining two-thirds will be other kinds of "things:" sensors, actuators, and newly invented intelligent devices that monitor, control, analyze, and optimize our world.
This seemingly sudden trend has been decades in the making, but is just now hitting a tipping point. The arrival of the "Internet of Things" (IoT) represents a transformative shift for the economy, similar to the introduction of the PC itself.
The IoT also opens a range of new business opportunities for a variety of players. These opportunities tend to fall into three broad strategic categories, each reflecting a different type of enterprise:
"Enablers," technology-oriented companies, such as Cisco, Google, HP, IBM, and Intel, that develop and implement the underlying technology.
"Engagers" that design, create, integrate, and deliver IoT services (like the Nest Learning Thermostat, Apple HomeKit, Hue, Tagg, Moj.io, and Sensity) to customers.
"Enhancers" that devise their own value-added services, on top of the services provided by Engagers, that are unique to the IoT (such as OnFarm and Progressive's Snapshot).
A wealth of opportunities exist for each of the three types of IoT strategy models: Enablers, Engagers, and Enhancers. Entering the fray, however, is an action that should not be undertaken lightly. Read more...
Board Games Played with People
Excerpted from Content Insider Report by Andy Marken
 A while back, I figured out that the consumer electronics (CE) industry — or the complete technology industry, for that matter — is a fashion industry.
The minute someone introduces something that's hot and sexy, the agile ones run out and schedule their well-staged major announcement (along with the obligatory "leaked" insider scoop), and it's dubbed an "innovation."
Then, at the next Consumer Electronics Show (CES), a gazillion copies appear.
With the latest rush of corporate breakups, I've realized business is just filled with fashionistas.
Hemlines go down, turtlenecks emerge, and management is on the hunt to buy someone, something to be bigger, better, and able to do it all.
Hemlines go up, necklines plunge; management streamlines for action. "We need to be lean/mean in today's environment."
Whether it's the push of financial institutions, the economy, or a search to find the magic key to increased profits; businesses go through fashion cycles similar to the clothing industry. Up, down, sideways.
Back when the financial market was in the toilet (the recession of 2008), funds rushed to invest in companies that were big and diverse. The idea was when one group was in a slump, the others could pick-up the slack and things would be "stable." Read more...
The IoT Is More than a Fashion Statement
Excerpted from the Business Spectator Report by Marc Diffey
 The pace of innovation is soaring more than ever before and its advancements directly impact the economy. Technological progress has spawned wave after wave of opportunities for numerous companies and not a week passes without the launch of a new app or news of a technology company expanding its footprint into another market.
Having been in the technology industry long enough, there's a saying that rings true: "All that glitters is not gold."
From the Apple Newton in the 90s to the more recent Google Buzz, it seems that according to the media, every new product or service promises to be the "Next Big Thing." Chances are however, that it's not.
Getting excited about the latest "game changing" piece of technology that results in total failure may not be such a dire mistake to make in the world of consumer technology.
In the realm of enterprise technology however, investing in the wrong technology can put the entire company at risk. So, how can enterprises avoid becoming caught up in the hype of the latest, greatest glittery thing?
The answer lies in fully understanding the benefits the new technology will generate, in both the short and long term. This is imperative so as to avoid making bad decisions.
Undeniably, the Internet of Things (IoT) is one of those technologies caught up in the hype machine at the moment. In Gartner's Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies report, it's apparent that the IoT has moved past "Big Data" to become a vibrant part of the business and IT landscape. Read more...
IoT Is Reaching Escape Velocity
Excerpted from TechCrunch Report by Matt Turck
 The frenzy around the Internet of Things (IoT) should be reaching its final countdown.
There has been a period of extraordinary activity in the IoT space since this original attempt at charting the ecosystem
for TechCrunch.
While the IoT will inevitably ride the ups and downs of inflated hype and unmet expectations, at this stage there's no putting the genie back in the bottle.
The IoT is propelled by an exceptional convergence of trends (mobile phone ubiquity, open hardware, big data, the resurrection of AI, cloud computing, 3D printing, and crowdfunding).
There's also an element of self-fulfilling prophecy at play, with enterprises, consumers, retailers, and the press all equally excited about the possibilities. As a result, the IoT space is now reaching escape velocity.
Whether we're ready for it or not, we're rapidly evolving toward a world where just about everything will be connected.
This has profound implications for society and how we collectively interact with the world around us. Key concerns around privacy and security will need to be addressed.
For entrepreneurs, the opportunity is massive. Where Web 1.0 connected computers and their data and Web 2.0 connected people and their data, Web 3.0 is shaping up to be connecting just about everything else — things, plants, livestock, babies. Each new wave has spun out giant companies (Google and Amazon for Web 1.0, Facebook and Twitter for Web 2.0). Will Web 3.0 create a comparable pair of behemoths?
The space has been evolving so rapidly over the last year and a half that our IoT landscape became quickly outdated. Read more...
Internet of Things, The Game Changer
Excerpted from the Huffington Post Report by Paul Mashegoane
 The world has never seen anything like this; not even science fiction movies exactly predicted this. We have seen a drop in the ocean of what's about to happen, approaching us at a lightning speed.
Internet of Things (IoT) is emerging as the groundbreaking industry expected to be $19 trillion, in 2020 more than 50 billion devices will be connected to the Internet, and IoT will be in full swing by 2025, but the race has begun.
Therefore, the question remains, "What's the IoT?"
IoT is the connection of devices and appliances to the Internet, where they can interact with each other without humans in the equation; this is where artificial intelligence comes in. These smart appliances will be enabled to be controlled remotely by your smartphone, too.
Possibilities are endless; your smartphone may know about your health more than your doctor does, your fridge may know about your diet than you know. The traffic system will get to a point where it will control itself to better monitor traffic, send the information to your car to navigate the city more easily, collect the data of what's happening on the road of accidents and traffic congestions, then send it over to the transport department.
Google and Facebook among many organizations are advocating for free Internet, to further get the next 3 billion people online. However these two mentioned companies are serving self-interest because once you get online, they will commercialize your visit to the visual world. Read more...
Industry Group Lays Out Principles for IoT
Excerpted from Ad Age Report by Kate Kaye
 A Washington think tank funded in part by corporate backers has published guidelines for collection and use of data gathered via the Internet of Things (IoT), the catch-all label given to devices and products like fitness-tracking wearables, web-connected thermostats, and data-generating vehicles.
Released today, the ten guidelines published by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation's Center for Data Innovation (ITIF) come in conjunction with an event featuring as speakers Republican and Democratic US Senators who sent a letter in October to Commerce Committee leaders requesting an oversight hearing on the IoT.
Despite a proliferation of Internet-connected technologies aimed at consumers, businesses, and governments, there have been few if any regulatory standards or policies devised to meet today's questions regarding proper collection and use of data created by IoT. The ten policy principles are intended to guide regulators in crafting policies for IoT data collection and use, and focus on preventing rules that could be deemed overly restrictive.
"We're hoping that the principles will help to direct the conversation in Washington," said Daniel Castro, senior analyst at ITIF, who suggested that much of the discussion about IoT among regulators and legislators thus far has focused on potential problems rather than benefits of IoT.
For instance, he suggested the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which held a workshop covering IoT data privacy and security issues about a year ago, should deal with actual scenarios rather than hypothetical privacy infringements that may or may not play out.
"It's easier to talk about hypothetical concerns," he said. "I think the FTC should be a little bit clearer on what they'd like to see." Read more...
How Washington Should Think about the IoT
Excerpted from CSM Report by Daniel Castro and Joshua New
 The Internet of Things (IoT) encapsulates the idea that ordinary objects — from thermostats and shoes to cars and lamp posts — will be embedded with sensors and connected wirelessly to the Internet. These devices will then send and receive data that can be analyzed and acted upon. As the technology becomes cheaper and more robust, an increasing number of devices will join the IoT.
Though many of the changes to everyday devices may be subtle and go unnoticed by consumers, the long-term effect could ultimately have an enormously positive impact on individuals and society. A connected world is capable of anything from improving personal health to reducing pollution to making industry more productive. However, this vision of a fully connected world will not be achieved without initiative and leadership from policymakers to promote its deployment and avoid pitfalls along the way.
The potential size and scope of the IoT is enormous, with the worldwide count of connected devices expected to exceed 40 billion by 2020. As technological barriers decrease and adoption of the IoT takes off, how policymakers respond to this technology will be critical in determining just how many of its benefits will be realized.
Of two conflicting approaches to the IoT, neither the "impose precautionary regulations" nor the counter "leave it completely up to the market" will allow societies to gain the full benefits from this revolution. The status of the IoT as an emerging technology necessitates a policy framework that is fully cognizant of its benefits, allows for future innovation, and responsibly protects against misuse without restricting its capacity to deliver social, civic, and economic benefits. Read more...
Coming Events of Interest
PDCAT 2014 — December 9th-11th in Hong Kong. The 16th International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Computing, Applications and Technologies (PDCAT 2014) is a major forum for scientists, engineers, and practitioners throughout the world to present their latest research, results, ideas, developments and applications in all areas of parallel and distributed computing.
Storage Visions Conference — January 4th-5th in Las Vegas, NV. The fourteenth annual conference theme is: Storage with Intense Network Growth (SWING). Storage Visions Awards presented there cover significant products, services, and companies in many digital storage markets.
International CES — January 6th-9th in Las Vegas, NV. The International CES is the world's gathering place for all who thrive on the business of consumer technologies. Held in Las Vegas every year, it has served as the proving ground for innovators and breakthrough technologies for more than 40 years — the global stage where next-generation innovations are introduced to the marketplace.
The DCIA's IoT in 2015 — January 6th-9th in Las Vegas, NV. Twelve hours of demos, displays, and discussions of all aspects of the Internet of Things (IoT), recorded for webcast in HD-video daily segments at the DCIA's CES exhibit booth in the Las Vegas Convention Center.
State of the Net Conference — January 27th in Washington, DC. With unparalleled opportunities to network and engage on key Internet policy issues, this is the largest Internet policy conference in the US and is recognized for its balanced blend of private and public sector participants.
Datacloud South East Asia — March 25th-26th in Johor, Malaysia. Datacloud South East Asia will assess the energy, scalability, security, architecture, and software challenges confronting operators of data centers and enterprises engaged in or considering transitions to the cloud.
Internet of Things Conference — April 15th-17th in San Diego, CA. The IoT Con will focus on how companies are using a variety of technologies, including ZigBee radios, Wi-Fi, and machine-to-machine (M2M)software, to connect things to the Internet, and how they are achieving real business benefits from doing so.
Internet of Things World Forum (IoTWF) — October (2015 Dates TBD) in Dubai, UAE. IoTWF is an exclusive event that brings together the best and brightest thinkers, practitioners, and innovators from business, government, and academia to accelerate the market adoption of the Internet of Things.
|
