APAC IoT has a CAGR of 34.1% from 2014 to 2020: Frost

Frost & Sullivan expects The Internet of Things (IoT) market to be one of the fastest growing segments in the Asia Pacific technology industry. Total Asia Pacific spending on Internet of Things is forecast to be US$9.96 billion in 2014 and will continue to grow at a CAGR of 34.1% to reach US$57.96 billion by 2020, the company said in its Analysis of The Internet of Things Market in Asia Pacific report.

Countries that adopted Internet of Things technologies early include Japan, Singapore, China, Australia and South Korea; however other countries in the Asia Pacific region (APAC) like India, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia are expected to be some of the fastest growing Internet of Things markets in Asia Pacific between 2014 and 2017.

Andrew Milroy, Vice President, ICT Practice, Asia Pacific at Frost & Sullivan said that there are several factors driving the adoption of Internet of Things in the region, such as regional government efforts to improve competitiveness in their economies and city planners' efforts to address social demographic challenges in their cities.

"From a technology perspective, the continued efforts to miniaturise and reduce the cost of sensors mean that sensors are expected to be integrated at the chip level and will be found in almost every device and home appliance. Furthermore the improved communication infrastructure in the region, coupled with the ready availability of cost effective compute and storage (cloud computing) will help drive development and adoption of Internet of Things," he said.

"The Asia Pacific region is characterised by a large presence of manufacturing economies and has one of the largest production networks in the world. This is expected to drive spending on Internet of Things applications in telematics and supply chain visibility. Internet of Things spending in the manufacturing industry is expected to be one of the fastest growing markets in APAC, growing at a rapid rate CAGR of 52.7% between 2014 and 2020."

Milroy also said that whilst IoT spending in logistics and transportation currently contributes to the bulk of IoT spending (and is expected to remain the largest IoT segment in APAC for the foreseeable future), IoT spending in the consumer technology segment is expected to experience phenomenal growth between 2014 and 2017.

Exhibit: Projected Internet of Things Spending, 2014-2020


Source: Frost & Sullivan.

The Internet of Things market is however not without its challenges. Security and information privacy are some of the largest hurdles to the adoption of IoT. With smart and connected devices embedded in business processes and tied to critical functions, the ability to negatively affect enterprises and individuals is increased significantly, the research firm noted.

The lack of standardisation and data sharing frameworks will also inhibit IoT adoption, as it results in fragmented and closed IoT ecosystems which reduce the justification and benefits of investing in IoT solutions. Lastly, the challenge of providing a sustainable and cost effective power supply to millions (and in the future billions) of connected devices is likely to affect the feasibility of IoT implementations in specific industries.

Nonetheless, the market is expected to continue to grow strongly and develop on multiple fronts, as large industry specific enterprises continue to invest heavily in industrial IoT technologies in their respective industries, and nimble small enterprises can leverage cloud and open source technology to develop innovative business solutions and services.