2016 will surely be described as a very good year for the growth of Internet of things (IoT) based devices around the world including Africa. Homes, businesses and whole industries experienced at least one significant IoT ‘disruptions’.
The biggest IoT trend in 2016 according to some analysts was the effort and investments that went into understanding how it really works. If it is true, that understanding therefore birthed the innovations we witnessed; increased IoT connectivity from cars, fitness monitors down to utilities, homes, and many aspects of business activities. Across the world, authorities were brandishing templates for smartcities like it was normals.
Nigeria was not left out in the IoT revolution in 2016. Apart from connected things, serious discussions were also centred on smartcities, e-government etc. There was increased use of drones in carrying out different activities in the country. Data from devices were employed to make business decisions. We also some the role of the chief information officers (CIOs) shift significantly from a business-led advisor to one who gets involved as early as possible in the discussions around the business’s tactical and strategic needs.
An analyst who spoke to BusinessDay said there will be more attention for IoT in Nigeria in 2017.
“I believe that the technology space in Nigeria will experience a lot of investments. This will not only come from the traditional investors, it will also come from entrepreneurs in the African technology space seeding out money to invest in smaller businesses or pulling them. The ripple of effect of internet of things gaining more ground in the global technology space will be seen in Nigeria,” Gossy Ukanwoke, founder of Nigeria’s first online university, Beni American University.
There are several areas IoT can be leveraged to provide urgent solutions in the Nigerian society. A good example of such is the economy. One of the predictions for IoT in 2017 is about 1.5 billion devices will be connected by the end of the year and this will grow to more than 20 billion devices in 2020.
Forbes predicts that global spending on IoT technology services and products will reach $253 billion in 2021 with Africa and Middles East accounting for about 5 percent of the source of spending.
A proactive government will not waste time to position itself for the opportunities an industry like IoT provides. While speaking at the NigeriaCom conference in Lagos that held in 2016, Tony Smallwood, Vodacom’s head of IoT noted that government can leverage IoT to provide solutions in health, education, agriculture, manufacturing, energy and security.
Additionally, IoT has the potential to make Nigeria’s dream of smarticities possible. Mega cities like Lagos have to adopt IoT technology to the rising urban challenges.
It is encouraging that the present administration under President Buhari appears to be looking towards the IoT direction in 2017 going by the discussions on e-Nigeria and supporting smartcity initiatives. But like the authors of ‘Internet of Things in 2016: The Implementation Roadmap for Nigeria’ pointed out the country has a long way to go in adapting and integrating IoT.
To make 2017 the year of Internet of Things, the recommendation of the authors in 2016 remain valid.
First, government must provide the legal framework for the operation of IoT in Nigeria. Second, there must be a healthy collaboration between the public and private sector in order to develop IoT infrastructures like broadband internet and power generation and supply. This collaboration might take the form of providing incentives and tax reduction.
