2019 Predictions - Smart Cities and Smart Spaces
January 15, 2019 | back to news
by Itai Dadon, Itron
As we forge ahead in 2019, the smart city industry will continue to develop and mature as the Internet of Things (IoT) become more and more connected.
Gartner noted that smart spaces will evolve in five dimensions in 2019: openness, connectedness, coordination, intelligence and scope - meaning individual technologies for these spaces are working together to create a collaborative, interactive environment. However, the success criteria for use of technology is often defined by the user experience. In fact, the more transparent the technology is, the more natural the experience will be. Most end-to-end solutions impacting smart spaces will include the following four components:
Devices
In this domain, the industrial IoT devices are starting to benefit from the tremendous growth the consumer IoT market has enjoyed in the past few years. Rapid democratization of high-computing and low-power platforms has opened the door to huge innovation in the areas of edge computing and sensor performance, including gathering more accurate information at higher frequencies and taking act on this data as close as possible to its source. Devices are increasingly capable of executing advanced use cases in near real-time.
Connectivity
Many standards exist today for networking devices in the field. Different technologies will apply to different markets and use cases. The rapid proliferation of connected devices, generating more and more data, will require the transmission of this information in a secure, reliable and efficient way. Scale and longevity are additional essential criteria for the selection of the right technology. At Itron, we believe we have been enabling the first smart space to ever exist - the city! Connecting millions of meters and smart devices around these cities that work together seamlessly creates a positive experience for the consumer and a winning business case for the utilities and cities operating them.
Data Platform
Collecting all the data and managing it according to the most rigorous standards of security is essential. Understanding how important it is for such a platform to enable an open - but controlled - use of the data, in addition to data from other sources, is the key to unlock the real transformation of smart spaces. In fact, many cities are adopting a policy of providing open access to data by default. This shared access across multiple interoperable systems will effectively enable the complex interaction between heterogeneous devices operating in the smart space. As an example, parking space sensors in a city is only useful if the information is available in real-time to drivers in an easily accessible and actionable way. Providing automatic guidance to that parking spot from within your car navigation system or the navigation system in your phone helps deliver the specific outcome, such as faster access to parking, that consumers expect. One of the biggest challenges we're seeing today is how to ensure all these systems speak the same language and understand the data being shared without extra integration or translation efforts.
Outcomes
What do we do with the information available to us? What is the objective of the smart space to begin with? We saw a lot of use of technology for the sake of technology. A careful understanding of the pain points we are trying to remedy and a meticulous study of the business case of the proposed solution will guarantee a real outcome to create continuous and repeatable benefits for all parties participating in the smart space. Cities and utilities that own these critical infrastructure assets can leverage their open platforms to enable more outcome-oriented solutions. With more mature device ecosystems powered by open standards-based platforms, developing an end-to-end solution is faster and easier than ever. We expect to see cities and utilities utilize these tools to accelerate innovation to deliver the outcomes that consumers demand.
In 2019, expect to see much progress across all these pillars. As deployment for systems begins, we expect them to deliver valuable data creating new opportunities. Currently, solutions at work deliver mostly independent and siloed solutions (e.g. parking sensors, air quality monitors, waste bin sensors, etc.). This current phase will allow important improvements in each one of those applications separately. However, the real transformation of our smart spaces will only happen after we are able to learn and realize how to fuse the data from all these sensors together.
About the Author:
Itai Dadon brings more than 15 years of experience in corporate leadership, new business development, and product strategy in the telecom sector to Silver Spring Networks. Prior, Itai worked at Broadcom in several capacities, including leading the software product team in the wireless connectivity division and business development activities across multiple industries, generating $100M in growth YoY. Earlier in his career, he held product marketing, business development, and sales positions for ST-Ericsson, Texas Instruments and e-SIM Ltd.
Itai holds a Master's in Engineering, Computer Science from the Paris Graduate School of Management school. A native of Jerusalem, Itai lived half of his life in France and speaks five languages.
As we forge ahead in 2019, the smart city industry will continue to develop and mature as the Internet of Things (IoT) become more and more connected.
Gartner noted that smart spaces will evolve in five dimensions in 2019: openness, connectedness, coordination, intelligence and scope - meaning individual technologies for these spaces are working together to create a collaborative, interactive environment. However, the success criteria for use of technology is often defined by the user experience. In fact, the more transparent the technology is, the more natural the experience will be. Most end-to-end solutions impacting smart spaces will include the following four components:
Devices
In this domain, the industrial IoT devices are starting to benefit from the tremendous growth the consumer IoT market has enjoyed in the past few years. Rapid democratization of high-computing and low-power platforms has opened the door to huge innovation in the areas of edge computing and sensor performance, including gathering more accurate information at higher frequencies and taking act on this data as close as possible to its source. Devices are increasingly capable of executing advanced use cases in near real-time.
Connectivity
Many standards exist today for networking devices in the field. Different technologies will apply to different markets and use cases. The rapid proliferation of connected devices, generating more and more data, will require the transmission of this information in a secure, reliable and efficient way. Scale and longevity are additional essential criteria for the selection of the right technology. At Itron, we believe we have been enabling the first smart space to ever exist - the city! Connecting millions of meters and smart devices around these cities that work together seamlessly creates a positive experience for the consumer and a winning business case for the utilities and cities operating them.
Data Platform
Collecting all the data and managing it according to the most rigorous standards of security is essential. Understanding how important it is for such a platform to enable an open - but controlled - use of the data, in addition to data from other sources, is the key to unlock the real transformation of smart spaces. In fact, many cities are adopting a policy of providing open access to data by default. This shared access across multiple interoperable systems will effectively enable the complex interaction between heterogeneous devices operating in the smart space. As an example, parking space sensors in a city is only useful if the information is available in real-time to drivers in an easily accessible and actionable way. Providing automatic guidance to that parking spot from within your car navigation system or the navigation system in your phone helps deliver the specific outcome, such as faster access to parking, that consumers expect. One of the biggest challenges we're seeing today is how to ensure all these systems speak the same language and understand the data being shared without extra integration or translation efforts.
Outcomes
What do we do with the information available to us? What is the objective of the smart space to begin with? We saw a lot of use of technology for the sake of technology. A careful understanding of the pain points we are trying to remedy and a meticulous study of the business case of the proposed solution will guarantee a real outcome to create continuous and repeatable benefits for all parties participating in the smart space. Cities and utilities that own these critical infrastructure assets can leverage their open platforms to enable more outcome-oriented solutions. With more mature device ecosystems powered by open standards-based platforms, developing an end-to-end solution is faster and easier than ever. We expect to see cities and utilities utilize these tools to accelerate innovation to deliver the outcomes that consumers demand.
In 2019, expect to see much progress across all these pillars. As deployment for systems begins, we expect them to deliver valuable data creating new opportunities. Currently, solutions at work deliver mostly independent and siloed solutions (e.g. parking sensors, air quality monitors, waste bin sensors, etc.). This current phase will allow important improvements in each one of those applications separately. However, the real transformation of our smart spaces will only happen after we are able to learn and realize how to fuse the data from all these sensors together.
About the Author:
Itai Dadon brings more than 15 years of experience in corporate leadership, new business development, and product strategy in the telecom sector to Silver Spring Networks. Prior, Itai worked at Broadcom in several capacities, including leading the software product team in the wireless connectivity division and business development activities across multiple industries, generating $100M in growth YoY. Earlier in his career, he held product marketing, business development, and sales positions for ST-Ericsson, Texas Instruments and e-SIM Ltd.
Itai holds a Master's in Engineering, Computer Science from the Paris Graduate School of Management school. A native of Jerusalem, Itai lived half of his life in France and speaks five languages.
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