A new Gartner report has forecast that there would be an estimated 1.6 billion connected things in use by “smart” cities in 2016, an increase of 39 per cent from 2015.
Smart homes, it said, would represent 21 per cent of the total Internet of Things (IoT) use in smart cities in 2016, and will record the highest increase over the next five years.
“Smart commercial buildings will be the highest user of IoT until 2017, after which smart homes will take the lead with just over one billion connected things in 2018,” said Bettina Tratz-Ryan, research Vice President at Gartner, in a press release on Monday.
Smart commercial buildings will lead with 518 million connected things in use in 2016. IoT deployment in commercial buildings will continue to grow at a rapid pace over the next few years, and is on pace to reach just over one billion in 2018. “Incentives into the deployment of IoT in commercial real estate will fuel its development,” said Tratz-Ryan. She said that the United Kingdom’s building information modelling (BIM) mandate, for example, requires that all public sector construction commencing in 2016 complies with BIM (level 2). BIM utilises data models coming from various information sources including IoT, which will be used by commercial real estate in the future.
Commercial real estate benefits greatly from IoT implementation. IoT creates a unified view of facilities management as well as advanced service operations through the collection of data and insights from a multitude of sensors. “Especially in large sites, such as industrial zones, office parks, shopping malls, airports or seaports, IoT can help reduce the cost of energy, spatial management and building maintenance by up to 30 per cent,” added Tratz-Ryan.
In smart homes, the consumer IoT applications that are fueling growth are smart TVs, smart set-top boxes, smart bulbs and various home automation tools such as smart thermostats, home security systems and kitchen appliances.
“Device and wireless standards will be embedded in more devices. Homes will move from being interconnected to information- and smart-enabled an integrated services environment that will provide value to the home and the individual ambience,” added Tratz-Ryan.