Throughout the past decade the Big Data-Wave has swapped over all companies, no matter which business they work in. Using Big Data technology makes an organization more productive, efficient, agile and innovative and also strengthens its market position. Big Data is still one of the growing segments of the worldwide IT market. Due to IDC, it represents a fast-growing multibillion-dollar worldwide opportunity. A recent IDC forecastshows, that the Big Data technology and services market will grow at a 26.4% compound annual growth rate to $41.5 billion through 2018, or about six times the growth rate of the overall information technology market. Additionally, by 2020 IDC predicts that line of business buyers will help drive analytics beyond its historical sweet spot of relational (performance management) to the double-digit growth rates of real-time intelligence and exploration/discovery of the unstructured worlds.
Analytics have always been an important tool to various businesses. In the beginning of IT-based business processes it was mainly used to quantify the most important customer transactions and correlated them by using demographics. Various filters could help to identify customers or customer groups and offer tailored products and services to meet their needs. Companies could make better marketing decisions, improve their success and lower their costs. The Internet changed the way data was collected and analyzed to meet the customers need. Cookies helped to collect data by every step a potential customer did on the website, and every research he started. Thanks to Big Data, companies now are able to analyze the internet behavior of persons and offer exactly the products and services, a customer is looking for.
A whole new level of customer service
With the Internet of Things (IoT) the industry faces the next dimension of data. It’s no longer only the customer behavior that creates Big Data. Within the IoT the data stream comes from the interconnected machines as well. Person-to-machine communication and machine-to-machine connectivity will create even more data and will offer more and new business opportunities. Analysts are convinced, that the economic impact of this evolution will be enormous and will change the way of production processes, business and services.
The car industry for example can connect their cars with the dealers and the manufacturer and collect data via the web. The collected data can be analyzed in real-time to find out, when the car is due for inspection or repair. The dealer can inform the customer in time and offer the necessary service. This will improve the customer relationship. On the other side the car manufacturer can exchange the car data with the dealer as well, to guarantee he always has the spare parts on stock, that are needed for requested repairs.
What is working with cars, also works for machine builders that serve various industries. Connected via the Internet of Things, every machine can communicate with the central IT of the machine builder. The machine and its components can be remote controlled and safeguarded, to make sure that they are working without interruptions. The remote data collection helps to identify problems, long before they cause problems on the customer side. Actions can be taken to guarantee the uninterrupted allocation of resources.
Our way of living and working is undergoing radical changes
In the future, more and more products will become part of the IoT. Not only business devices, but also private equipment will be connected and collect own usage data. This will generate various profiles of devices and of their users. The industry will gain better information about their customers by analyzing how the products are used. Customers can be informed in time, long before a problem occurs by remote controlling the function of devices during their lifecycle. Offering repairs in time will make services more effective and save time. Customer satisfaction will improve.
The new dimension of data collection will change our way of living and working. And it will have a big economic impact on every industry. In the future, production processes will be able to meet the individual needs of every customer – not matter if he will need thousands of units of one special product or only a few. But the IoT will also make all companies more dependent on IT technology and telecommunications, as the web will become the central platform for data collection. The internet has to be highly available and all the components need to work with high performance to meet the needs of the connected world. Otherwise all wheels will stand still.
Read more about a data revolution in manufacturing in the Intel Solution Blueprint “Automating Field Service with the Internet of Things (IoT)”.
What is your concrete idea to improve processes with the new dimension of data collection? Tell us your visions of the future!
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