To keep up with the trends for the Internet of Things (IoT) market, Avnet recently conducted its annual Global IoT Survey and published the results. Respondents were asked a wide range of questions, from business-oriented to technical. The results were interesting, showing that while companies are eager to jump into IoT technology, they prefer working with partners rather than building solutions alone.
Demographics
There were a total of 2263 respondents, most of whom are engineers or in a technical role, however, there were a significant number of non-technical respondents. The audience was global, however, the majority of respondents were from Europe and North America. 91% of the respondents were men.
The demographics are very similar to those of the previous year.
Key Findings
Respondents believe that the top drivers of IoT are Industry 4.0 and Energy Management. Energy Management showed a significant increase from the previous year’s survey, showing that the costs of energy are a growing concern.
The top reasons cited for the slow growth of IoT were technology limitations/retrofitting difficulties and return-on-investment (ROI). These show that respondents are concerned with the difficulty/cost of IoT deployment, and developing more simplified solutions may help in wider adoption.
The top factors most likely to accelerate the adoption of IoT were Open Standards and Interoperability – certifying standards, two related reasons. Ease of development fell compared to the previous year, suggesting that development tools and methodologies for IoT solutions have improved.
Unsurprisingly, the greatest number of respondents felt that the greatest value in IoT data is in Productivity/Manufacturing Improvement. This has been demonstrated by the quicker growth of IoT and Industry 4.0 compared to other sectors.
Continuing the trend, the top programming languages are C/C++ and Python, followed by JavaScript. Many use multiple languages in their development.
76% of respondents use wireless connectivity, leaving 24% using wired connectivity. Of the 24% using wired connectivity, Ethernet was by far the big winner, with 69%. For wireless connections, WiFi is most widely used, with 45% of the respondents, while Cellular and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) following close behind.
The amount of respondents using or considering incorporating AI jumped dramatically, showing that the technology is becoming more accessible. Some of the top uses of AI were preventative maintenance and robotics.
Single Board Computers (SBC) continue to be popular with IoT, with Raspberry Pi and Arduino dominating the field. Avnet products showed an increase in usage, while Beagleboard SBCs had a slight decline.
As far as vendors for development platforms and MCU/MPU, STMicroelectronics and Microchip were the most popular choices.
With cloud services, Google has the lead over AWS and Azure. However, the percentage of respondents using a Personal Cloud Solution dropped from 34% to 26%, showing that Google, Amazon, and Microsoft are improving with their IoT cloud offerings.
Sensors are key to IoT systems, and the respondents used a diverse array of sensors. Environmental sensing came in at the top spot, while motion and opto sensors tied for second place. However, the huge variety of sensors deployed signifies great diversity in the IoT applications being deployed.
Read the results of the 2022 Global IoT Survey
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