Business and IT leaders now expect a return on investment (ROI) for the Internet of Things (IoT) projects within three years or less, a survey conducted by IDG Connect for Japanese information and telecommunications company Fujitsu reveals.
This shows that IoT projects within the enterprise are maturing and have now entered the early mainstream stage, according to Fujitsu.
"Almost three-quarters of respondents (73 percent) confirmed that IoT deployments have advanced well beyond the testing and market education stages, with almost half of these delivering results," the study noted.
The poll also found that almost a third (31 percent) expect a return from investments in IoT projects within one to two years, and 56 percent expect profitability within three years.
Businesses are using IoT for a wide range of purposes, with the joint-highest survey responses were for improving health and safety (47 percent), enhancing security (47 percent), in using newly-available data to create smarter strategies (47 percent), as well as improving maintenance (46 percent).
Moreover, 45 percent of businesses are already using IoT to generate new revenue-making opportunities, and a quarter of respondents consider the biggest opportunity to be the ability to charge premium prices for valuable additions to products, data or services.
Just over a fifth (22 percent) of respondents cited the ability to cost-effectively create better and more differentiated services to attract new customers.
"It’s clear from the survey results that enterprises are already enjoying a solid return on investment from IoT projects. This should be a compelling incentive to dip a toe in the water for any organization that’s still skeptical about getting any business value from the IoT,” Yves de Beauregard, Head of Digital Business Solutions at Fujitsu in EMEIA, said.
However, due to the complexity of IoT projects, services suppliers and equipment providers are failing to deliver.
"Major concerns are the need for better support (24 percent), closer collaboration so that vendors understand their customers’ unique needs (23 percent), a call for lower pricing (20 percent), greater contractual flexibility (17 percent) and more readily available as-a-service options (15 percent), the study reveals.
The research was undertaken by IDG Connect in the summer of 2018. Around 330 business and technology leaders were polled from organizations with more than 250 employees in France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, India, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and Ireland.
A substantial majority of respondents represented businesses with between 500 and 4999 employees.
