IoT will turn asset management into a 'horrific nightmare'

But organisations shouldn't rush into spending millions on new infrastructure, says Coreix's Paul Davies

The Internet of Things (IoT) will lead to a "horrifically horrible situation" in regards to asset management, according to Paul Davies, technical director at Coreix.

Speaking at Computing's Internet of Things Business Summit 2016, Davies said that clients found it hard to provide a full inventory of everything within their data centre.

"When asked whether clients have a full inventory of everything connected in their data centre, there are so many that don't, so it is going to be a horrific nightmare," said Davies.

IoT is used in many industries to improve asset management practices. But it is the transition to using IoT devices that is likely to cause issues, particularly because investment in IT infrastructure should precede the deployment of IoT but often doesn't.

However, despite his serious misgivings, Davies believes that there shouldn't be scaremongering about IoT and whether enterprises will be able to cope with the vast increase in the number of devices they will have to manage.

"We're already living in [IoT]. It is in our everyday lives. We have clients using IoT infrastructure, but they don't call it that. There are sufficient resources, and we're an agile and flexible industry so we will be able to deal with any problems that arise," he said.

He added that the reason he believes that the IT industry will be able to cope with the rise in the number of IoT devices is the adoption of IPv6.

"We've had a lot of scaremongering over the years... and the reason [companies] didn't adopt IPv6 when it was launched in 1998 was because it didn't have a ‘killer app'. So it has taken us 15 years to partially adopt IoT - now everyone is using it because we suddenly need it," he said.

However, in terms of infrastructure, Davies recommends that enterprises don't panic and start spending millions on anything new. Instead, they should transition slowly.

"Based on the fact we're coping at the moment, I would suggest that we don't sit and do nothing, slowly make a plan to upgrade infrastructure to cope but don't go spending millions on something you don't need," he said.