About That Internet of Things

IMS Research made waves this week with the news that we’re about to hit the 5-billion mark with Internet-connected devices. That’s billion with a “B”. The news isn’t shocking given all the laptops, smartphones, connected TVs, tablets, and other gadgets we have floating around, but it does have serious implications. First, remember that IPv6 issue? It’s no wonder we may run out of IPv4 addresses as early as the end of this year. And as the market shifts to IPv6, online content and service providers may find their applications don’t work everywhere, or for everyone. The clock is ticking fast.

Second, a lot of connected devices mean a lot of bandwidth demand. And the online applications that perform best in a bandwidth-constrained environment are the ones most likely to succeed with consumers. It’s all about infrastructure. More connected devices mean companies need better infrastructure and delivery support to stay competitive.

Third, with more connected devices come more platforms that companies need to address in their mobile content delivery efforts. Got an iPhone app? Great. How about something that works on the Roku? Or in a Yahoo TV widget? Or on an Android tablet? There are 5 billion devices out there! And there will be quadruple that many in another decade.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 18th, 2010 at 10:25 am and is filed under Content Delivery Network. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.