Five Key Considerations for Large-Scale IoT Deployments

IoT is a domain with remarkable use cases already and with a very huge potential on the sphere. Nowadays, IoT Deployments get surprisingly more attention typically for large-scale enterprise applications. Many companies were focused more on connected devices communication, smart cities, smart cars, wearables and more.

Unfortunately, there are few companies that face challenges with huge-scale IoT project deployment. To help companies with IoT project deployment, we have enlisted key factors to consider for large-scale IoT Deployments. Devices, Connectivity, device management, application and data processing are the backbones of any IoT project, which needs to be considered at the initial phase of the project. This blog will strive to enclose considerations that are specific to building solutions for Large scale IoT Deployments.

IoT Devices

Devices are the startup phase of any IoT Project. Gartner, Inc. evaluates that 8.4 billion connected devices will be in use worldwide by the end of 2017 and the number will reach 20.4 billion by 2020. Dell’s CEO also evaluates that nearly 70 billion connected devices will be live by 2020. Any large-scale IoT deployment will likely to have different legacy devices that utilize various technologies and assist several purposes eventually reflecting the development of the IoT field and the extent of your deployment.

The scale of the IoT yields many challenges to deployment. We have seen a dramatic rise in the number of connected devices in our home from just a router to various smart devices that remotely lock doors, control lighting, regulate temperature and humidity, and more. For this multitude of devices to keep connected and secure, over-the-air (OTA) firmware upgrades must become an essential part of IoT systems.

Sustain Connectivity Irrespective of Circumstances

A broad variety of IoT connectivity standards are already accessible in the market. When selecting devices it is also necessary to consider connectivity as the devices require supporting your desired connectivity standard. Many organizations preferred Wi-Fi or any other well known wireless technology.

At the same point, your project might have certain requirements and need connectivity in areas where Wi-Fi is not available. Further, your devices might be too resource-confined to even utilize Wi-Fi. At this point, it is better to consider cellular connectivity and moving towards cellular IoT.

NB-IoT makes it possible to connect with more devices in the areas which are difficult to reach and at lower power consumption than other connectivity technologies before it. Certain features such as low power consumption, long battery life of cellular connectivity combined means that industries will have access to connectivity technology that allows scaling up of their current proof-of-concept setups.

Device Management

As many IoT deployments involve thousands to millions of devices, it is required to track, analyze and handle connected device fleets. You want to be assured that your IoT devices to work precisely and safely after they have been deployed. It is also necessary to secure access to your devices, analyze health, recognize and remotely troubleshoot problems and manage software and firmware updates.

When testing the few devices, even a small fault within a device can be handled manually. However, once a project has initiated to scale up, it is not possible to execute even the most basic operations such as onboarding, security patches, maintenance, configuration manually if there are a large number of connected devices.

It’s also possible that few of the devices deployed are difficult to reach. It may happen that you have devices six feet under the ground to gather soil data or devices in the ocean to track marine life. In this case, it is difficult to send out a technician if anything goes wrong. On the other side, even if the device is available, it’s still not usable (financially) to send technicians. However, without certain maintenance, these devices can become a major obstacle and a potential security risk that no company wants to be a part of. It is necessary to keep the focus on connectivity and industry standards, as the protocol stack can make or break a project.

The bigger your deployment, the more strong and flexible your device management solution requires to be so that you can manage anything coming your way–and this can only be secured with suitable protocols.

Build an Extensive View with Data

Devices are continuously accumulating data which is generally the concept behind any IoT project. However, data is not useful unless it’s combined and specifically processed. The huge volumes of data currently being generated by connected devices need a truly “big data” perspective. It is important that the platform can integrate deep predictive analytics from historical data along with real-time events.

Hence, assuring that some kind of low-latency, high-throughput database facility is combined into the overall workflow is especially important. In addition to a huge scale, IoT workflows need fast lookups and sometimes update of data, which needs a very fast database facility that doesn’t tolerate breakdowns in performance. Projects with a huge scope tend to be parceled into smaller portions under the act of being more manageable that way. So make assure that all your data is in place and that you have a complete picture of your project.

Application Oriented

Application is another way to outline a deployment of an IoT project. When we have hundreds and thousands of devices with several sensors and actuators that assemble heaps of data every second of every day, it is possible to lose control quickly if you don’t have a platform to control it all.

The platform you select requires to be adaptable to assist various solutions and adaptable to future changes that are constant in the IoT industry. IoT platforms combine several abilities and features into a solution, essentially allowing deploying IoT projects and developing applications in a faster, more cost-efficient and united way, at the same time supporting as a bridge and solution to overcome IoT concerns in allowing these applications and eventually outcomes.

We can say that large scale deployments need a lot of foresight and careful planning. We have to look at our project and need to consider all possible alternatives and outcomes, even so, how troublesome a task it may look. And that is the best approach to a huge-scale IoT deployments. IoT solutions thus requires to be built right, to develop and scale, along with the business essentials they power.