IBM is investing $3bn over the next four years in a new Internet of Things (IoT) division. The move follows earlier IoT projects: IBM's work in Smarter Planet and Smarter Cities was based on practical applications of IoT in the enterprise and led to a broad set of solutions, ranging from water management to optimising retail and customer loyalty to alleviating traffic congestion.
One of the drivers will be speed: IBM estimates that 90% of all data generated by devices such as smartphones, tablets, connected vehicles and appliances is never analysed or acted on. As much as 60% of this data begins to lose value within milliseconds of being generated.
With new industry-specific cloud data services and developer tools, IBM will build on its expertise to help clients and partners integrate data from a number of IoT and traditional sources.
These resources will be made available on an open platform to provide manufacturers with the ability to design and produce a new generation of connected devices that are better optimised for the IoT, and to help business leaders across industries create systems that better fuse enterprise and IoT data to inform decision making.
"Our knowledge of the world grows with every connected sensor and device, but too often we are not acting on it, even when we know we can ensure a better result," said Bob Picciano, senior vice president, IBM Analytics.
"IBM will enable clients and industry partners to apply IoT data and build solutions based on an open platform. This is a major focus of investment for IBM because it's a rich and broad-based opportunity where innovation matters."