Organisations 'lack leadership' and are underprepared for Internet of Things boom, warns Gartner

Survey suggests organisations lack leadership when it comes to IoT transformation

The Internet of Things (IoT) will transform businesses and offer significant channels of new revenue in the next three years, but few organisations have established a clear strategy to take advantage of a connected devices boom.

That's according to analysts at Gartner who surveyed almost 500 IT and business leaders. They found that despite 40 per cent being of the opinion that IoT will benefit their business in the next three years - and 60 per cent believing this will happen in five - many had no leadership strategy in place to take advantage of it.

"The survey confirmed that the IoT is very immature, and many organisations have only just started experimenting with it," said Nick Jones, vice president at Gartner.

"Only a small minority have deployed solutions in a production environment. However, the falling costs of networking and processing mean that there are few economic inhibitors to adding sensing and communications to products costing as little as a few tens of dollars," he continued, before warning that organisations face challenges when it comes to connected devices.

"The real challenge of the IoT is less in making products 'smart' and more in understanding the business opportunities enabled by smart products and new ecosystems."

Despite Gartner's warnings, a survey published by Forrester in November last year suggests the UK is leading the way in Internet of Things adoption.

However, to properly take advantage of the predicted IoT boom, Gartner said businesses need to ensure that employees at all levels have an understanding of what the technology can do.

"Organisations need executives and staff to understand the potential of the IoT if they're going to invest in it," said Steve Kleynhans, research vice president at Gartner.

"While a single leader for the IoT is not essential, leadership and vision are important, even in the form of several leaders from different business units," he continued, going on to predict that businesses will become more aware of the challenges as IoT becomes more prevalent in general.

"We expect that over the next three years, more organisations will establish clear leadership, and more will recognise the value of some form of an IoT centre of excellence because of the need to master a wide range of new technologies and skills."

Senior IT leaders still lack a full understanding of the potential impact of the technology, Gartner said. Government, education, banking and insurance have all been singled out as areas where even top level executives have a minimal grasp on what IoT could mean for their organisations.

There are also issues around privacy, security and skills that are currently deterring organisations from properly examining the potential of the IoT, as Jones explained.

"Security and privacy are, unsurprisingly, top issues and industries dealing with intangibles were more concerned with security and privacy than those dealing with tangibles because many operate in very security-aware areas such as banking," he said.

"Obtaining staff and skills is another major inhibitor for many respondents, particularly those who expect the IoT to be transformational because they are likely to need sophisticated skills relatively urgently," Jones added.

Many technology firms are already taking a strong interest in the IoT and Samsung president and CEO BK Yoon has urged collaboration across industry in order to make it a reality.

"It is our job to pull together - as an industry, and across different sectors - to make true on the promise of the IoT," he said.