What Surprised You About the Results of the Premier Farnell 2018 Global IoT Survey?

IoT is such an evolving space that every few months something new can pop up and take over the conversation. When I was forwarded Premier Farnell's 2018 Global IoT Survey today, I anxiously opened it up and was looking for the surprises--those jewels of new information that make me think "I didn't know that," or a simply a "WoW!"

The survey was conducted late 2018 over a two month period and received well over a thousand responses. "Global" should be stressed here; the responses spanned 51 nations. Let me dig into my surprises and not-surprises of the survey.

There was no surprise that Security was on top when asked about what's the most important thing to think about when developing an IoT application. But I was very surprised that an ecosystem garnered a mere 7 percent. A number of suppliers have stressed the importance of an ecosystem to me. I'd actually like to know more about this question.

The big surprise and disappointment for me was that of the nearly 1,000 respondents, only 7 percent were female. I read this as a bigger issue than it appears, and goes beyond IoT.

There was no surprise that Home Automation ranked as the top industry for IoT within the next 5 years. But I am blown away totally surprised that Wearables ranked at a mere 7 percent and Transportation at 8%. Say, what?  Personally, I would have ranked transportation on top. To prove my point, check out the Chicago Auto Show that is going on right now. Even Forbes would agree with me.

Another gigantic surprise: nearly two-thirds of the respondents said they awere not using a third-party provider to help them build their IoT solutions; rather, they are doing it themselves. Understandably, building it yourself gives you more control, but the cost....man, the cost of it all!

No surprise that most of the respondents believe that data should be owned by the individual, not the entity gathering it (e.g., big websites in the news everyday).

Another no-surprise is that interoperability and having certified standards would be the most important way to grow the IoT.

IoT is an innovative and disruptive technology, right?  If so, why did only 26 percent of the respondents say that innovation was the main reason they were developing an IoT solution? Practical market needs seems to rule the day; perhaps, that's no surprise.

There was no surprise that C/C++ was the choice of programming language for IoT devices. Nor was there a surprise that Wi-Fi was the preferred wireless communication protocol. But I was surprised that BLE only ranked at 27 percent, especially with BT 5.0 coming out (low power, longer range and greater data rate)

When asked about what hardware was used to design their IoT gateway, 50 percent mentioned SBCs. Hopefully, the Raspberry Pi is in the mix!

What do you think? What Surprised You About the Results of the Premier Farnell 2018 Global IoT Survey?