International. Buildings are in the midst of a crisis, not only the pandemic that has reduced commercial building occupancy to zero for extended periods last year, but also a crisis of how to operate in the post-COVID environment.
Public health will remain the focus even after the shutdowns end and employees are able to return to work. Therefore, our commercial buildings will be in the spotlight as potential hotbeds of infection where any outbreak could lead to building closures that would affect business tenants. Building owners, therefore, strive to develop their buildings in any way that can monitor, manage, and prevent occupant behavior that could lead to an infection. For many, this means making their buildings smarter with IoT technologies.
"The built environment has never had it harder. The first buildings remained dormant; now, they are under increasing pressure to deliver a higher return on investment (ROI) and protect returning occupants in a post-pandemic market where supply outstrips demand. It's a pressure on decision makers to keep tenants' environments safe, comfortable and efficient," says Hima Mukkamala, CEO of Pelion in a blog post that was part of the inspiration for this article. "Those who turn to IoT for answers certainly see results, but the appetite for truly smart spaces comes with complexity and risk."
For most companies, the first foray into IoT usually focuses on unique, application-specific projects that provide a clear return on investment. However, the value has been shown to increase as this IoT data is merged with other datasets, incorporated into predictive or prescriptive analytics, and used to integrate processes that cross divisional and organizational boundaries. Successful IoT deployments have been shown to be those that chart a clear multi-year path to these higher-value capabilities. However, only 16% of companies "firmly" agree that their use of IoT has been based on a global data strategy, according to surveys for The Economist's The IoT Business Index 2020.
Security concerns also remain a major barrier to IoT adoption according to the survey. 45% of respondents say safety concerns have held back consumer adoption, although respondents from the retail and consumer goods industries agreed the least. 37% say these concerns have deterred their companies from pursuing an IoT strategy. The survey also reveals that security capabilities grow as companies deploy to higher levels, with 55% of respondents whose organizations have achieved "extensive" IoT adoption saying they have the expertise and internal resources that IoT security requires.
"The devices are exploding, both in terms of the quantity deployed and their diversity, monitoring everything from temperature to air quality and presenting a growing target for criminal activity. Networks that were previously independent, each with its own method of communication, now have to integrate with systems for which they were never designed," says Mukkamala. And this landscape remains complicated after deployment, as devices and systems that were initially standalone receive updates that could compromise system interoperability throughout its extended lifecycle... Those longer lifecycles will become an increasingly important factor as the operational life of a building is extended and managed by a variety of systems that are introduced over the years. ".
To address this growing complexity, a partnership has been established between Pelion and Johnson Controls to accelerate innovation in creating connectivity, security and intelligence. Focusing on expanding the capabilities of Johnson Controls' OpenBlue technology, the cooperation will seek changes similar to those that have been achieved within the automotive sector, where software, multiple sensors and AI-trained models have transformed the industry by enabling autonomous driving and software updates. that combine data to continuously improve vehicle capabilities and experience.
The new partnership aims to create a secure and open approach to device management that will allow OpenBlue to run any device and hardware configuration, from hardware gateways to restricted temperature sensors. In order to provide low-cost, low-power intelligent processing at the edge, the partnership will also use energy-efficient processors from Pelion's parent company, Arm, which are a key part of Johnson Controls' distributed hardware implementation.
AI is proving vital to realizing the true value of IoT data. In The Economist survey, 26% of respondents say IoT data is critical to their current or planned use of AI, and 56% identify IoT as "one of the many important sources" for AI initiatives. Another 64% agree that the value of IoT data to their organization has increased as we develop their AI capabilities. Many of those interviewed in the survey see IoT and AI as two components of advanced analytical capability, and many commonly report that algorithms trained on data sources, including IoT, provide the most value and competitive differentiation.
In a post-pandemic world where a virus outbreak in a single building could disrupt the operations of multiple companies, the competitive advantage of having a virus-smart building has never been greater. Buildings will strive to apply IoT approaches to health and safety to keep their tenants happy, but also to attract new tenants looking to minimize the risk of COVID-related disruptions.
This should lead to greater IoT adoption in the short term, and smarter buildings will plan ahead to use post-COVID upgrades as a platform to develop even greater IoT capabilities in the future.
Source: Memoori.
