The Other 49 Billion Things
M2M market analyst Beecham Research has just predicted that there will be 1 billion cellular M2M connections worldwide by 2020.
It means that over 700 million M2M SIM cards will find their way inside a connected device within the next 5 years: that is quite a sizable market to grab for Mobile Network Operators around the globe.
However, since 2010, there is another number that is being used by many when predicting the number of connected devices worldwide by 2020: 50 billion.
No matter if, by 2020, there will be 20, 50 or 100 billion connected devices, it is certain that the connectedness of the overwhelming majority of those will not generate any revenue for the telco's as we know them today. Hence their ambition/need to expand outside of their traditional M2M connectivity business.
Some telco's consider investing in low power, long range communication infrastructures - probably better suited for many IoT use cases - and thus perpetuating their connectivity business with an even lower ARPU.
Some are prepared to listen to their enterprise customers and M2M partners who scream their need for the tools, infrastructure and services they require to build, run, charge for or sell the millions of IoT applications that the market expects. These forward-thinking telco's aim at generating new revenue from the 50 billion connected devices that will most probably not use the telco's networks!
Map your software inner workings!
9yGood ideas, Ashish. But what you suggest requires Telcos to go through a major customer-centric transformation. Currently, their sales force only cares about how many minutes, messages, megabytes their customers need. Monetizing data, selling solutions require deep industrial expertise to understand the business challenges of their customers: Telcos are not there yet but some have already started their digital transformation.
Wonder if telcos are going to revise their rate plans and licensing terms speciallyf or M2M Use cases .. what if a remote M2M network connections are connected to a single gateway with a cellular modem and telco is pricing that at higher rates ?