There are currently more devices connected to the Internet than there are people in the world. The Internet now connects a staggering 10 billion devices today. And this number will continue to grow, as more devices gain the ability to directly interface with the Internet or become physical representations of data accessible via Internet systems. This trend toward interactive device independence is collectively described as the Internet of Things (IoT).
To put the IoT’s explosive growth into perspective, Gartner estimates the IoT market at 26B devices by 2020. Cisco says IoT will add over $14 trillion dollars in economic value add by 2020. McKinsey predicts IoT will add $310B in incremental revenue to companies that embrace it. The numbers are huge with good reason: IoT embodies a revolution in the way enterprises are interacting with customers and how customers experience the enterprise world.
As with previous global technology trends, such as widespread mobile adoption and datacenter consolidation, the changing operating environment associated with the Internet of Things represents considerable impact to the management of a complex network of Internet-connected systems. The increase in Internet-connected systems and the accompanying, non-linear increase in devices can represent both a business opportunity and service management, remediation and automation challenges in the enterprise.