A report by Markets and Markets predicts that the retail IoT market will reach $35.5 billion by 2025. Here are three ways IoT is already making waves behind the scenes in retail.

Image Recognition

Retail is a complex business with a lot of moving parts, and not all of those moving pieces involve customers directly. Many improvements that IoT offers affect the customer experience, but the customer won’t know the full extent of the role that technology played in getting their package delivered on time. For example, warehouses need to operate at maximum efficiency and output to promise customers a specific delivery date range.

But warehouse employees often become exhausted and start losing concentration after several hours of work, which causes errors and delays. With image recognition, businesses can increase employee output without interfering greatly in their workflows. For example, IoT-enabled image recognition devices use AI to identify any incorrect product placements, labeling, price tagging, and low stock issues.

Image recognition is also used to visualize the complete picture of work, allowing errors to be found in real-time and fixed before it impacts the business or customer.

Automation in Operations

Retailers can use IoT to track orders, manage delivery, keep an eye on their warehouse, and inventory items in real-time. Tracking assets helps reduce the cost and effort of manually tagging and moving them.

Automation can step in to take care of the hard work, but it won’t come without significant investment in emerging technologies like AI, augmented reality, beacons, digital signs, and more. IoT sensors and devices already exist to track assets for the purposes of automation, but they need to be added to an ecosystem that will allow them to perform at their highest potential.

Many companies have implemented beacons with a return on investment. Beacons can be used to track movements around the store, and the resulting data can be analyzed to understand how customers navigate around the store. You can also utilize beacons to send customers coupons and notifications about promotions based on their real-time location and past purchase behavior. Ultimately, when done with the right frequency, beacons can enhance the customer’s shopping experience and elevate the business’s brand image.

Order Fulfillment

Order fulfillment is a major part of the retail experience. It’s so important to e-commerce that companies like DHL, Alibaba, and Seattle-based Amazon invest massive amounts of budget into optimizing their inventory tracking and order fulfillment operations. With IoT, the complexity of pulling the correct item, packaging it up for shipping, generating the correct shipping label, and sending it off to the carrier no longer is prone to errors.

Employees often experience less physical injury, feel safer, and report more productivity when working alongside IoT technology. That alone is a great major benefit of IoT. When your employees are happy, your customers are happy.

IoT is also used in order fulfillment to provide a real-time look at inventory on the shelf. Kroger has been utilizing RFID tags, sensors, and IoT devices to create 2,000 smart shelves that accurately track inventory. Analysts at Kroger then analyze the best place for products, what products need replacement or refilling faster, and how product quality affects consumer behavior. This analysis is used across many Kroger stores, and it’s also used to directly impact the store that’s generating the data. The manager can be alerted to a wet floor or a fire that just started.

Kroger’s smart shelves also integrate with the Kroger app to send customers coupons and promotions when they’re in the right aisle. They utilize the app to highlight items on the customer’s Kroger app shopping list as they’re walking in the aisle. This is an improvement and idea that any retailer who sells a wide variety of items can employ to upgrade the customer experience.

It’s also extremely important that retailers prioritize their equipment when implementing IoT. IoT is a great technology that can help reduce equipment replacement and repair costs by tracking the performance of the equipment and identifying any anomalies in the data. By finding the issue faster, retailers can simply maintain their equipment, rather than allowing it to break down and cause multiple days’ worth of revenue loss.

Drones and GPS trackers are other technologies that can help retailers better take care of their costly equipment. For example, delivery vehicles can be tracked for wear and tear and mileage. After the vehicle has driven a set amount of miles, it should be serviced. This lifts the burden of tracking miles off of the driver, allowing them to focus on delivering the package to the correct address. IoT devices can also measure engine performance or listen for any sounds that seem abnormal.

The Next Generation of Shopping

IoT is a technology with immense potential if you know where to use it and how to use it. It provides end-to-end transparency into the supply chain, warehouses, inventory, logistics, and order fulfillment. IoT can even revive a dying retailer by offering a new unique value proposition for the customer. The future is bright for retail and e-commerce thanks to IoT.

IoT has the potential to change the customer experience for the better by prioritizing customer concerns with faster response times and adding value to products and services. Here are five ways IoT is improving marketing.

#1: Upgrading the Customer Experience

Using data generated from IoT applications, we can learn more about our customers to understand how they view our products, services, and brand. We can also optimize how we structure product displays, plan out e-commerce experiences, and advertise items to customers who have an obvious preference based on historical purchase behaviors. Amazon gives their customers “Dash buttons” so that the customer can place an order with the touch of a button when they remember they need a detergent refill or another delivery of a pre-picked grocery order.

This allows Amazon to meet their customers where they are without forcing them to find their phone, open the Amazon app, and take steps to place an order. Not only do Dash buttons save time and effort for the customer, but they also generate more revenue for Amazon through customer loyalty and repeat orders.

#2: Developing Customized Experiences

One of IoT’s biggest strengths is its usefulness in creating customized experiences and products for customers. Knowing the customer’s purchase intent, buying behaviors, and return patterns, we can use it to inform digital marketing and advertising strategies. We can also recommend more items that the customer is less likely to return. According to a significant majority of retailers surveyed, IoT has been shown to positively impact the customer experience, giving the retailers an immense advantage over competitors who don’t use IoT to glean information about their customers.

For example, McDonald’s collaborated with San Diego-based Piper, a Bluetooth beacon company, to greet customers on their smartphones when they entered the restaurant. In exchange for completing a survey, McDonald’s offered the customer a coupon to use at the counter. But the best part about the experience is that the surveys were sent to the manager while the customer was still in the restaurant, allowing the manager to quickly fix things and make amends before the customer left. This is as close to real-time customer support as it gets.

#3: Optimizing Pricing and Profits

IoT can help your business change up pricing strategies and product deelopment. Rolls-Royce has outfitted its airplane engines with integrated sensors that transmit the engine’s status and performance metrics in real-time to an IoT system. The company can watch over every engine and charge customers for replacement, repairs, and maintenance services at a fair price to both the business and the customer. This also lifts the burden off of the customer to keep a steady maintenance schedule of their own, and the business can offer an “engine-as-a-service” monthly subscription.

Rolls-Royce’s engine-as-a-service model bundles the engine’s base cost with potential repairs and maintenance fees using data analytics that tracks and monitors fuel consumption as an engine usage metric. IoT makes possible real-time monitoring of data, control over analytics, and the ability to take action quickly and on the spot. With enough creativity, IoT can unlock new products and pricing models for any company in any industry, making features like remote activation and deactivation a part of the package.

#4: Faster Transactions

Customers have shifted their views of online shopping from “Is shopping online secure?” to wanting a quick and smooth checkout experience. Marketing experts predict that the customer experience will grow so large in importance that it may leave pricing and product offering behind in determining the efficacy of a marketing strategy. IoT-enabled mobile apps can deliver the best customer experience at the right moment, and since it’s IoT, you don’t have to serve up a delayed experience; you can make an impression in real-time.

Walgreens partnered with Google Tango and Aisle411 to create an IoT-enhanced platform that offers customers a responsive customer experience. The platform offers a mobile shopping podium that allows customers to search for what they came to buy and locate it in the online and physical store for more convenience. The app allows customers to find what they’re looking for without finding an employee to ask for help. In return, the app gives customers relevant and personalized marketing offers and coupons.

Hilton Hotels use IoT as part of a high-end customer experience package for guests. It offers guests the ability to check-in to their room and get their room key by using only their smartphone. The app tracks small data metrics, like how many pillows the guests used, if they ordered room service, and much more.

#5: Connecting Products Together

Seamlessly connecting products together is the ultimate customer benefit and one of the best IoT features for customers. If your business can think how users think, you can create business relationships with seemingly unrelated companies and create an amazing customer experience. For example, for premium Spotify users, their playlists will automatically load whenever the customer boards an Uber ride. This takes away some of the interaction of asking your driver to connect the car’s Bluetooth to your phone and avoids the possibility of any technical difficulties or frustrations.

IoT Is Integral to the Future of Marketing

Marketing is increasingly becoming more data-driven, and the customer experience is growing as a priority for many businesses. With the added connectivity and tracking that IoT offers, customers will ultimately benefit from a better shopping and support experience, which should positively impact business growth and learnings. The sooner your business can figure out ways to improve your customers’ experience with product connectivity, real-time tracking and analysis, and personalization, the faster it’ll grow in the coming years.

Edge computing is growing in popularity and functionality, and it’s the perfect tool to interface with Internet of Things (IoT) applications to reduce cloud utilization and speed up analytics. As a result, edge data centers are proliferating, and they’re being used in cutting-edge 5G and distributed computing applications. In fact, by 2030, the Ericsson Mobility Report predicts that there will be 125 billion working IoT devices. Of those, 3.5 billion will need cellular IoT connectivity, and all of this connectivity will create 800 zettabytes of data.

Unifying Edge and IoT

Why is it so important to integrate edge with existing IoT systems? According to Jeffrey Fidacaro, a senior analyst at New York City-based 451 Research, edge is the “infrastructure topology that supports the IoT applications.” In other words, it offers a map of the relationship between devices and sensors and the holistic IoT application. Thus, says Fidacaro, it’s important to build a unified edge/IoT strategy that optimizes how you’re using your infrastructure and offers more options.

Without an integrated IoT solution that stores, organizes, and transforms data into actionable insights, enterprises are not spending their money wisely. They’re also leaving themselves vulnerable to critical operations issues and avoidable problems. By integrating an edge data center into an existing IoT application, we can remain “always-on” and connected.

Edge data centers also reduce response time by conducting calculations and analyses on the end device, rather than in the cloud. This can save several seconds of data transmission, and it can result in massive cost savings for the most expensive issues your business faces. For example, an edge computing sensor can let you know immediately when an important piece of equipment is starting to behave abnormally, allowing you to take action much earlier than you would have in the past.

Edge data centers are often built closer to end devices, but the data centers need their own facility and data monitoring. Because these sites can be located in remote, hard-to-reach areas, it’s best to utilize IoT to monitor, protect, and maintain the facility around the clock.

If you think integrating edge computing into your application can help solve your business needs, here are seven crucial features to look for in an edge-enabled IoT platform. With these functionalities, you’re sure to get best-in-class performance and full control over your IoT system.

#1: It’s Scalable

Make sure that the edge IoT platform you’re looking to contract with offers scalability. Not only does it need to offer the ability to scale, but it needs to allow you to scale quickly. After all, what is the point of working with cutting-edge technology if it doesn’t move fast when you need it to?

An example of this includes allowing you to collect and manage data from one location or across a number of global locations. Or maybe your portfolio size has grown immensely in the past few days, and you need more bandwidth to seamlessly take on the extra work. Your chosen edge IoT platform should allow you to continue generating critical insights without limiting your future or business’s potential.

#2: It Offers Cost-Effective Pricing

Whenever you’re working with innovative technology, it can seem expensive due to limited access and limited knowledge involved. But transparent pricing is vital to any business relationship, and edge IoT platforms are no different. When you want to upgrade or downgrade your features, there should be clear pricing for things like connecting to cloud analytics services or third-party applications without any added hassle.

#3: It’s Flexible for Integrations

The right edge IoT platform should plug into your existing systems without any major overhaul or development. It doesn’t matter if you’re using older equipment with new software or second-hand equipment with legacy software. Readily integrating into your current setup should not be a big ask from your new edge IoT partner.

#4: It Avoids Commissioning

To keep things moving quickly and seamlessly, the right edge IoT platform should be able to deploy new features or scale quickly without requiring onsite commissioning. Ideally, the platform should offer a single-source Bit API that integrates any analytics tool or feature.

#5: It’s Cloud-Based

It might not be clear from the offsite setup feature in #4, but having a cloud-based edge IoT platform is critical for those devices and sensors that need it. From there, accessibility, simplified connections and integrations, and easy setup are secondary but equally important requirements. Ultimately, the cloud reduces costs and eliminates the need for on-site programming tasks that often take up a lot of time and budget.

#6: It Allows for Ethernet Connectivity

An ideal edge IoT platform should be able to enable data access and transmission with hard-wired ethernet connectivity as a backup connection. The platform should also allow for an outbound IP port that offers a secure connection for data transmission.

#7: It’s a Comprehensive IoT Toolkit

A comprehensive toolkit can be flexible enough to be tailored to almost any business need. It should come with all of the essential tools you need to build an IoT solution without a lot of external help. IoT devices and sensors should be easy to install, and they should support a wide variety of data pipelines and transmission protocols.

Get an Edge on Your Competitors

Don’t settle for just any edge IoT platform. By performing the due diligence early on, you can save your business more in money and time. With edge integrated into your IoT system, you’re enabling true real-time analytics, monitoring of equipment and machinery, and facility management. Finding a platform that offers these seven features will set your business’s IoT system up for success.

More and more people are talking about the Internet of Things (IoT). It seems these days that IoT applications are everywhere changing people’s lives and how businesses and industries operate. But what is this promising, all-encompassing technology?

IoT is an emerging technology that will bring about a transformation in our cities, homes, and businesses, allowing us to operate smart cars that talk to each other, live in smart cities that reduce environmental impact, and automate business processes. Read on to learn about how IoT works, what it does to help us automate things, and how it’s already being used in real-life situations.

What’s IoT?

Today, the Internet connects us all to each other through social media and communications like instant messaging and email. But IoT takes this connection one step further by connecting devices and sensors together. In other words, your laptop may one day be connected to your thermostat, doorbell security system, and car.

IoT technology is a perfect fit when you might be thinking, “I wish I could start my car from my bathroom in the mornings so that it’s warmed up for my morning commute” or “I wish I could start the washer without getting up from the couch” or “My work could be done faster if I could automate these processes.”

When we talk about IoT, we are talking about connecting everything (yes, everything) to each other. That means we ultimately want to have a world that’s so connected that every device is connected to each other or to the Internet. As a result of this goal, many people become confused about the broadness of IoT, so let’s cover why it’s beneficial to connect devices and sensors to the Internet.

Why Is IoT Important?

Whenever something is connected to the Internet, it’s sending and/or receiving information. Have you ever checked out your Internet speeds to find an upload and download speed? That’s referring to the speed at which your Internet connection allows you to send and receive information or data. When we’re able to send and receive information, it can make our devices and applications smarter, allowing them to achieve more complexity without sacrificing quality or speed.

For example, smartphones can allow us to watch any video in the world. But the videos reside in “the cloud”, where your phone can ask permission to view it, and the cloud can stream it to your device. The smartness of the phone doesn’t rely on having a ton of data saved onto the device; it depends on its ability to communicate with another connected entity to receive information.

In IoT, you can put everything into one of three categories: first, sensors collect information and sent it to another device. Second, computers get the information and act on it (or save it to the cloud for later retrieval). Third, there are devices that accomplish both of these things by themselves. Connecting these three types of data transmitters can yield you an application for almost anything you can think of.

Data Transmission for Decision MakingSensors collect data over time, like motion, temperature, air quality, light, moisture, and nearly anything else you’d want to measure about an indoor or outdoor environment. When connected to the Internet, sensors send the information to another device or to the cloud. We can act upon this data depending on the conditions we set beforehand.

For example, agriculture is a great industry for IoT applications because farmers can collect data about nearly anything in the environment: weather, soil moisture, crop growth, and more. Using this data, the farmer can decide to forego watering his or her crops if a lot of rain is predicted in the next day. Sensors enabled machines to make sense of an environment.

Often, sensors can transmit this data in real-time or close to real-time, saving users a lot of time and effort. We already use real-time sensors to print out documents quickly, open our garage door upon clicking a button, and when scanning your library card to check out books.

Bringing Everything Together

When we use devices that can both collect and send data and then analyze it and act upon it, we are removing the need for a human to step in. For example, in farming, sensors are collecting information about the soil and other aspects of the environment. But instead of having the farmer keep an eye on all of the data so that he can manually turn on or off his irrigation system, we can directly connect the irrigation system to the sensors.

In fact, the irrigation system located in Ohio could be sending information to an analysis software being developed in New York City, and it would still take no effort from the farmer to ensure his crops get the best opportunity for high yield this year. Keeping up with this system for years can build historical data, allowing a computer program to optimize the performance of the farm equipment for the largest, juiciest crop yield and minimize any losses.

This is an example of just the soil moisture sensor and irrigation equipment. Imagine what else can be optimized when sensors are collecting information about temperature, light, air quality, and more. Algorithms work best with multi-dimensional data, so more data is always better for automation.

IoT Is Technology For a Brighter Tomorrow

IoT is all about connecting humans together better by connecting devices and sensors to computers and cloud services. This allows us to continuously automate, optimize, and improve our lives and businesses without a lot of human input. The world is going to work drastically differently in the next few decades, and it’s all possible because of IoT.

These processes are a perfect fit for the Internet of Things (IoT), which can help with untangling complex supply chains and keeping track of chemical processes without a loss in efficiency or quality of drugs. In comparable industries, like chemical manufacturing, these operations are being phased out in favor of IoT applications that simplify and streamline many of the tedious tasks involved in each process.

The Numerous Challenges of Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

Manufacturing relies on time and continuity for maximum efficiency. But in the pharmaceutical industry, things aren’t so cut and dry. Drugs are usually developed in large batches, involving mixing compounds in large vats. Upon mixing, the product needs to sit for a while to measure the quality of intermediate products. This can cause delays across the entire company.

After the new chemical compound is measured for its quality, it moves to another step, which can sometimes involve another facility. Because of the timeline and amount of floor space required for each drug’s development, machinery isn’t used continuously. And information and data about the quality, status, and condition of the chemical compound are often stored and distributed through a variety of systems. Many companies still record and store data on paper.

For manufacturing to be optimized for maximum output and efficiency, machinery needs to be used continuously. This means planning ahead, even by years, to experience the biggest cost savings. This is how it’s done across a variety of industries, and pharmaceutical companies need to catch up.

IoT technology is a perfect match for these business and processes problems, and it offers more flexibility, transparency, and return on investment than anything else on the market. But the road to modernizing the pharmaceutical industry’s manufacturing processes is a very rocky one.

Navigating Necessary Regulations

The pharmaceutical industry is heavily regulated due to the life-or-death consequences of its products. When regulations need to be considered, lengthy delays usually follow. For example, to submit a drug for approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), you’re required to submit detailed paperwork of every single part about the drug’s manufacturing process.

This includes the active compound, the manufacturing process, and even the layout of the chemical plant. If there any changes to be made in the process, it first requires direct approval from the regulatory committee along with some paperwork. Because of these regulatory hurdles, pharmaceutical companies require much more planning of their experiments and drug development.

To help cut down the time it takes to navigate regulations and receive approval, the FDA started the Emerging Technology Team (ETT). The ETT’s goal is to encourage new manufacturing methods, like continuous manufacturing. This enables pharmaceutical companies to submit their ideas before submitting the regulatory paperwork

IoT and Compliance

The FDA isn’t the first regulatory body to improve drug development. In fact, more than 100 such agencies exist across the world, and they all require their own paperwork, which can be a major timesink for global pharmaceutical companies. The ETT has made positive change and growth for the pharmaceutical industry, however.

Boston-based Vertex Pharmaceuticals has been using continuous manufacturing for their cystic fibrosis drug, Orkambi, since 2015. In 2016, Janssen Pharmaceuticals switched over to continuous manufacturing for their HIV drug, Prezista. Both companies worked closely with the FDA to ensure approval of the modern manufacturing process before they submitted their drug approval paperwork. According to Johnson & Johnson, separating testing and sampling using IoT sensors afforded the company a significant improvement over their previous methods.

By combining medical applications with IoT, pharmaceutical companies can remotely monitor and document every step, variation, and concentration during each part of the manufacturing process. The best part is that they can do everything in real-time, enabling plant operators, researchers, and chemists to know what’s happening during the entire process. Companies can also track drugs for recalls if a specific chemical poses a problem for consumers.

Pharmaceutical supply chains are complex and finicky. Often, a reliable chemical supplier can lose their inventory overnight, causing global problems in drug manufacturing. With IoT, pharmaceutical companies can monitor and document the activity of their contract manufacturing organizations, which are hired to complete much of the manufacturing of the drug.

Additionally, pharmaceutical companies often use different suppliers and vendors to manufacture the active ingredient, formulate new drugs, and package the medication. Regulatory bodies want to monitor, track, and report on each company’s vendors, and IoT can deliver everything in a nice wrapped-up package with a bow.

The Future of Pharma

We need pharmaceutical companies to survive, but we can lower drug prices and the cost to research and develop new medications by introducing IoT technology into the current outdated manufacturing processes. Above all, pharmaceutical companies need to maintain a strict level of high quality in their drugs. Currently, if a drug has possible quality issues, it’s treated as spoiled. But with IoT, tracking down chemical sources will be easier so that action can be taken quickly.

As pharmaceutical equipment tends to be expensive and labor-intensive to produce, continuous manufacturing is even more necessary to improve drug development. And although continuous manufacturing saves a lot of time and resources, it can cause major disruptions in manufacturing from equipment failure. As a result, IoT sensor data, real-time asset management, and preventative maintenance will become bigger priorities.

The Internet depends on DNS to deliver webpages and allow web access, but many people are unaware of what exactly DNS is, what it entails, and how it works. Keep on reading to expand your knowledge of one of the Internet’s most important features.

What Is DNS? How Does It Work?

DNS is an Internet tool that we all use every day without explicitly seeing it working. It makes browsing the web more accessible and easier to navigate. While browsers and computers look at websites with their numerical identifiers as IP addresses, like 123.45.678, humans are unburdened with memorizing these numbers to get to their favorite retailer or social media website. Humans actually see domain names, like facebook.com or nordstrom.com.

To make the transformation from numerical IP addresses to user-friendly domain addresses, DNS is needed. DNS translates the domain names we type into the browser into IP addresses for the computer and browser to understand and access. For users, DNS saves us headaches and complications that come with memorizing a string of numbers, not to mention multiple number strings.

To understand how DNS looks up the corresponding IP address and translates it for the browser, we need to cover the process of a DNS lookup as it r0utes information through four different servers: resolving name server, root name server, TLD name server, and the authoritative name server. These four servers handle different tasks in the DNS process and work together in tandem like a well-oiled Internet browsing machine.

When you type in a domain name, the resolving name server gets the request and sends it to each subsequent server in the search for the corresponding IP address. The root name server points the resolving name server in the right direction so that it can find the corresponding TLD name server. The TLD name server handles the last part of the domain name (.com, .co.uk, .org, etc.), and there’s a TLD server for every type of TLD. The last server, the authoritative name server, returns the correct IP address to the resolving name server, closing the loop.

A Real-Life Example

To understand more about each of the four servers, let’s go through a real-life example of the DNS process with additional details about parallel processes. Say you’re searching for dogtownmedia.com. You type dogtownmedia.com into your browser’s URL bar.

What happens next is that your browser will check its cache (internal memory) to see if you’ve visited our site before. Let’s say this is your first time visiting dogtownmedia.com. Because your browser doesn’t have our site in its cache, it’ll need to fetch its IP address manually.

The computer’s operating system sends the request for the IP address lookup to the resolving name server, which starts the DNS lookup process. The resolving name server says it doesn’t know the IP address, so it asks the root name server for it. The root name server doesn’t know it either, but it can narrow down the possibilities by asking the domain name’s TLD name server (in this case, .com).

The resolving name server asks the .com TLD name server if it knows the IP address for dogtownmedia.com. The TLD name server has a master list of all .com domains and verifies that dogtownmedia.com is on the list. It then tells the resolving name server to ask the authoritative name server for the IP address.

Ultimately, the authoritative name server has the correct IP address, and it returns it to the resolving name server. The resolving name server then tells your computer what IP address it just found for dogtownmedia.com. The computer sends the IP address to the browser, and the browser loads the dogtownmedia.com home page.

You might think this entire process takes minutes to complete, but in reality, it takes less time than it takes you to blink once. Let’s jump into how DNS works so quickly.

How DNS Affords Speed

DNS works so fast that you don’t even know you’re waiting for it to work its magic when you type in a new domain name. It happens so seamlessly and quickly that it seems built-in or not even there. But DNS has several speed optimizations put into place to ensure it works extremely quickly and efficiently.

One way, as we saw earlier, to save time is to maintain a browser cache. This cache is stored on your local machine in its memory. Once you visit a site one time, the IP address is logged for faster retrieval in the event you visit the website again. Caching helps circumvent the creation of a new DNS lookup request. Your computer’s operating system may also have a caching system that stores IP addresses. When your browser doesn’t find a match for a corresponding IP address, it first checks your computer’s operating system’s cache before launching a new DNS lookup request.

Another way DNS maintains its speed and efficiency is by running different types of queries. The three main types are: recursive, iterative, and non-recursive queries. The lookup request uses a recursive query to get the correct IP address from four DNS servers.

An iterative query will work to find an answer too, whether it’s an error message or an IP address. Iterative queries are used to check the browser’s and operating system’s cache for an existing IP address, but if there’s no cached IP address, the query will keep going down the chain until it gets an answer back. Non-recursive queries are the fastest type, and they are used to look up the domain name in the browser and operating system’s cache. If there’s no cached IP address, this query won’t keep pursuing the lookup request in search for an answer, however.

It’s easy to see how DNS could work quickly with these types of queries to help a user located in London access a website hosted in Singapore with a TLD of .sg.

The Beauty of DNS

DNS works in the background so efficiently that it’s difficult to pinpoint when exactly it has been activated. As users, we are highly dependent on DNS to work quickly and correctly for us. But without DNS, navigating the Internet would be much less user-friendly, and it would create more complexity in IoT development. Thanks to DNS, our jobs as IoT developers are a little bit easier to accomplish.

As devices and sensors start becoming increasingly connected and technologically advanced, mobile apps are springing up to help users manage their Internet of Things (IoT) applications and systems. These mobile apps offer access, connectivity, and communication with technology to improve the smart city and smart home experience. But mobile app development is complex and requires planning and continuous optimization to better serve users.

For mobile apps that control IoT devices, sensors, and systems, user happiness is of the utmost importance. Here are seven challenges that a mobile app development firm may face when designing and developing an app for smart devices.

#1: UI/UX Design

User interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design are important facets of any consumer-facing technology. In mobile apps, UI and UX can make or break an app’s success with users. And without users, a mobile app is worthless. Ultimately, proper investment in UI and UX will attract more new users and engage loyal users.

It’s important to establish an app’s UI and UX guidelines early on so that any future changes are made in accordance with previously-established principles for branding, device support, user profiles, and more. With these instructions, new and old designers can work to maintain a consistent user experience. Although it can be tempting to skip UI and UX, don’t make the mistake of putting your users in the corner. Without their feedback, constant use of the app, and word-of-mouth recommendations, your mobile app could be doomed to fail. The time spent in introspection to develop UI and UX specifications will also help inform decisions and ideas further down the development cycle.

#2: Data Flow Management

It’s imperative to create a consistent experience for users by controlling the management of data flow. This requires a stable Internet connection, strong device and connectivity uptime, and a stable database connection. Databases are often used to collect data from multiple types of devices and sensors and aggregate it for use in an application with a front end, like a smartwatch, mobile app, or web app.

Because smart devices differ in their singular data management, it can be difficult to organize data together in a way that makes sense. However, this is an extremely important and foundational part of IoT systems management, so exemplary data flow is necessary.

#3: Network Connection

Speaking of stable and consistent data flow, network connectivity is an important cog in the IoT system. From there, anything is possible: smart analysis, predictive insights, and real-time notification systems are just a few features that can set your mobile app apart from its competition. The network connects all devices and sensors together before they collate their data into a database for later use.

As IoT technology advances, network demand will continue to grow. Networks need speed, a stable connection, and proven performance to adequately aggregate all devices and sensors under one umbrella.

#4: Network and Sensor Compatibility

It may not be enough to spring for a top-of-the-line network connection and infrastructure if devices and sensors aren’t compatible with the network. Because real-time communication and data transmission are necessary to allow users control over the IoT system, ensuring compatibility between the network and devices is essential. The compatibility needs to be stress-tested to ensure many devices and sensors can connect without issue, and the testing needs to occur periodically to make sure nothing has fundamentally changed.

The reason for this issue is that sensor and device manufacturers and vendors don’t work under standardized protocols. Besides the network and device compatibility, this can also lead to major issues with device-to-device compatibility. Thus, it is important to test this early on, rather than being close to the end of the development cycle and having to nearly start over.

#5: Hardware Compatibility

When devices aren’t compatible with each other, it usually becomes obvious pretty quickly. To avoid lengthening the development timeline with this issue, set specific hardware requirements early on in the project. When resolved early, it can prevent issues with the app’s functionality later on.

#6: Performance and Security

Although it’s difficult to optimize for, speed and performance are what a user requires as a prerequisite to user experience. With a slow or lagging mobile app, you’ll create frustration in your users, prompting them to leave negative reviews on your app’s page. Extensive user testing and interviewing is a great way to avoid major bug reports and application crashes while gathering UX and UI feedback.

Similar to speed and performance, security is a foundational requirement for users. If they find out that their data, especially sensitive information like login credentials, is stored insecurely, you can face substantial user backlash and even lawsuits. To ensure your application’s security is robust enough, set security standards at the beginning of the project for all designers and developers to follow. Make this a best practice if you’re planning on developing more mobile apps in the future. At our mobile app development studio in Los Angeles, we always prioritize security and performance in our mobile apps from day one.

#7: Choosing Development Technology

Early on in the development process, the development team has to agree upon the technology stack they’ll use to develop the application. The choice between building a native, hybrid, or cross-platform app can be made by looking at what existing interfaces exist and how the mobile app fits into the IoT ecosystem. Often, one technology will be the clear frontrunner that will allow for a strong user experience, flexible data flow management, and performance and security optimizations.

If needed, reach out to an experienced IoT app development firm for a short consultation. Ultimately, it’s important to squash this issue early.

Taking On Challenges

These seven challenges may seem difficult to overcome, but they are common and every mobile app development team faces them. How you tackle them and continue on to the next issue will determine how well your mobile app will meet your business requirements and users’ preferences. Above all, make sure you’re rising up to the challenges early on, rather than waiting until users start complaining about the issue.

This marriage of two seemingly unrelated fields has been named “The Internet of Medical Things (IoMT)”. Here are five examples of IoT and IoMT innovations we can look forward to.

Digestible Sensors

This concept may sound like it’s straight out of a sci-fi movie, but it’s a real technology in today’s healthcare ecosystem. Pharma companies have figured out how to manufacture pills with sensors embedded inside of them. The patient swallows and digests the pill, and your doctor has a first-hand look into your body.

The sensor is often no bigger than a grain of rice, and it transmits data to a patch worn by the patient. Information like vitals is sent to the patients’ care team’s smartphones, including the caregiver, family, and provider. For elderly patients, these ingestible sensors can help families keep track of their loved one’s medicine consumption and dosage from afar.

Reduced ER Wait Times

It’s well-known that going to the emergency room can result in long wait times, sometimes up to 12 hours. Although most of us won’t go to the ER until the last minute, most of our time spent in the ER is in the waiting room. At New York City-based Mt. Sinai Medical Center, the hospital staff knew they had to work on fixing this major issue.

They used IoT technology in the form of bed-tracking software from AutoBed and existing tools from GE Healthcare to track the status of 1,200 beds in their hospitals. The software used 15 different factors to determine each patient’s needs and estimated time of leaving the ER. With this information, the hospital staff was able to better prioritize patients in the waiting room and optimize down the time spent waiting by 50%. This is a massive improvement that immediately elevates the patient experience.

Automated Insulin Delivery

Monitoring blood glucose levels and taking action is arduous and repetitive. It requires attentiveness all day every day for life. Without enough focus, a patient can be at risk of death, so it’s extremely important to automate this technology when and where possible.

A new closed-loop insulin delivery system named Open Artificial Pancreas System (OpenAPS) brings us the benefits of custom IoT development. It automates the checking of blood glucose levels in the patient’s body and gives the patient the correct insulin dosage. By connecting an insulin pump and glucose monitor to the system, OpenAPS’s algorithm can create a stream of communication between the sensors and devices.

The automated delivery of insulin is especially invaluable at night when many patients are too busy sleeping to worry about staying within their required blood glucose range. Unfortunately, night-time hypoglycemia can be fatal, and OpenAPS can be customized for both hyperglycemic and hypoglycemic patients.

Treat and Monitor Cancer

Cancer is a widespread medical problem that affects hundreds of thousands of patients every year. With IoT, we can determine a baseline for cancer symptoms in their early stages and use it to compare daily sensor and device readings. IoT can also help us adjust and create treatment plans based on need and progress.

New wearables technology is being used to detect early signs of breast cancer using a combination of machine-to-machine communication, artificial intelligence (AI), and predictive analytics. This technology tracks the breast tissue’s temperature over time and looks for abnormalities. These types of noninvasive and nontoxic treatment and monitoring solutions are possible because of emerging technologies like IoT and AI.

Remote Patient Monitoring

Beyond the pandemic, remote patient monitoring (RPM) has become a popular way for providers to get in touch with their patients without requiring them to leave their homes for an in-office visit. For patients with chronic illnesses or cancer, this technology can save them from fatigue or immunocompromising situations. RPM is also a great tool for the 60 million Americans who live in rural areas where the nearest hospital can be hours away. Additionally, RPM wearables can be used to monitor patients after an operation.

RPM devices and sensors send accurate medical data to providers, offering the patient faster medical treatment and testing for any abnormalities. In general, RPM saves patients hospital expenses and helps medical facilities keep down their readmission rates. 60% of Americans have at least one chronic disease, and RPM technology can save them a lot of time and money. Studies have shown that RPM can reduce all-cause mortality by a massive 20%.

A study undertaken by the University of Mississippi Medical Center involved using RPM to monitor Type II diabetes patients living in rural Mississippi. All regular appointments were scheduled through the RPM software and with connected devices. Ultimately, patients were able to save themselves from driving about 10,000 miles for medical appointments, and none had to visit the ER.

The Future of IoMT

Medical care has become indispensable during the pandemic, and IoT is helping care teams and hospital staff provide more efficiency, faster response times, and reduced waiting time. IoMT is saving the lives of patients who have diabetes, chronic illnesses, post-operation woes, and those who live in rural areas. We can’t wait to see how these five technologies will be used across the world within the next few years.

For senior citizens who were able to quarantine alone or live alone throughout the pandemic, technology has taken over many aspects of senior care so that nurses and family can safely ensure their patient and loved one is staying healthy and well. Internet of Things (IoT) applications like fall detection and alert devices, behavioral monitoring sensors, and malnutrition and dehydration trackers have worked tirelessly to support caregivers and elders alike during the pandemic. The hope is that these devices will identify signs of a larger issue so that it can be stopped before becoming serious enough to require hospitalization.

Fall Detection Devices

In elderly populations, falls are a major concern. Falls become more common with age and are the second leading cause of unintentional or accidental deaths worldwide. Thus, it is important to control as much as we can for falls both at home and in senior care facilities.

IoT technology can help caregivers prevent, predict, and detect falls by helping them record falls, pinpoint risk factors in the environment and the individual, and learn preventative and corrective measures. Conventionally, fall-detection technologies have used devices that the elderly person carries or wears. When the patient falls, they have to press the button on the device. This solution is great if your loved one is living across the country in Los Angeles while you’re in Atlanta.

But this method doesn’t account for patients that didn’t fall but don’t feel well enough to get up or for patients who haven’t been feeling normal recently. IoT can detect changes in the patient’s wellbeing by monitoring for discomfort and wellness. IoT sensors can help caregivers track their patients’ progress for days or weeks at a time and compare metrics to see if their patient’s health is declining, which is a risk factor for falling. This can support caregivers to act earlier and provide more care to make up for the senior’s deteriorating wellbeing.

Staying Home Longer

Research shows there may be a link between moving out of the home and into a senior care facility and dying earlier. For many elderly patients, it’s important for them to stay somewhere familiar and accessible to their families. IoT can help families remotely keep an eye on their senior family member by sending daily information about the patient’s health and wellbeing without any action necessary from the senior. When used with tele-assistance services, IoT technology really shines for seniors.

Companies like Vitalbase and SeniorAdom are working on remote assistance technology using IoT systems. Their tools include geolocation pendants, motion detection sensors, and wrist band devices. This hardware is supposed to automatically detect changes in behavior, motion, physical strength, and cognition.

By anticipating risks, sending early notifications to family and caregivers, and acting quickly in an emergency, these companies are making it possible to protect our seniors without expending more money, time, and effort. For example, SeniorAdom uses a self-learning algorithm and a smart box connected wirelessly to sensors in the senior’s home. With these devices and software, the company can detect abnormal situations or critical problems and send a warning to relatives and caregivers. SeniorAdom also uses motion sensors and door sensors to create a general daily schedule of the senior so that abnormalities are more obvious when they occur.

A Look at the Sensor Technology

These IoT-enabled sensors work on an 0G network which is used to send small amounts of data over a larger distance. They don’t pick up any personal or private information while they detect differences from the baseline conditions and movements. 0G devices also utilize low amounts of energy, making the overall cost a lot lower for the family.

For devices that run on other networks like cellular devices, it’s possible to utilize 0G as a backup network to ensure a stable connection for around-the-clock supervision and emergency communication. Vitalbases’s Vibby OAK is an automatic fall detection device worn on the senior’s neck or wrist. It connects to a cellular device (like a smartphone) but uses a 0G network when the cellular connection is unstable or unreachable. At healthcare and senior living facilities, devices operating on the 0G network can communicate with existing nursing call systems to keep medical staff updated in the event of an emergency.

More Autonomous Living

Many seniors want to continue an independent, autonomous, and healthy lifestyle. By outfitting their home and body with several devices and sensors in an IoT system, it’s possible for relatives and caregivers to remain vigilant, proactive, and connected without having to ask their seniors to leave home for good.

Almost 70% of organizations globally have dealt with an IoT cyberattack in the past few years. These worrying numbers are expected to grow as IoT increases in growth and popularity. Here are some ways to secure your IoT devices, ranging from complex to simple adjustments you can make in your home or office.

Strengthen All Passwords

This is the easiest thing you can do, so do it first. Set strong passwords and use a variety of usernames (other than ‘admin’) to secure your IoT network and devices. It’s difficult enough to remember passwords as it is, but try to change your passwords every 1 to 3 months. To help maintain a single source of truth for all of your username and password combinations, use a password manager to organize them.

The password manager also helps you ensure that none of your passwords are too similar or too easy to guess. Sharing passwords and usernames puts you at a higher risk for a successful hack, so do your best to avoid patterns across your passwords. It’s also important that, when you first add a new device to your existing network, you go into its settings and customize the device and its entry points to use different usernames and passwords.

Many hackers traditionally try ‘admin’ first to get into the network or device, and eliminating that possibility makes the hacker’s job much more difficult. Customize the device’s settings to enable only what you need.

Secure Your Connection

Look into boosting your router’s security. It connects your IoT devices and network to the Internet, and it’s vulnerable to exploitation and hacking by bad actors. Replace the default network name, admin username, and admin password with stronger alternatives. And like we mentioned in the previous section, make sure you change the username and password regularly.

Next, investigate whether you’re using the highest level of encryption on your router. If your router doesn’t support WPA2, you should highly consider upgrading to a new router that does. You can also consider further fortifying your internet security by separating networks for IoT devices and personal devices.

Don’t Forget Multi-Factor Authentication

Multi-factor authentication (MFA) can be a pain to go through every time you need to sign into an IoT application. On the other hand, it serves as a lifesaving tool when you forget your password or if someone changed your password without your permission or knowledge. Depending on how strong you want your security to be and what types of data your IoT devices store (a baby monitor versus a refrigerator), you may want to add more authentication devices and steps to increase the complexity of your security setup.

MFA can include something simple like adding your smartphone into the authentication chain or something more complex like a physical authentication which involves inserting a physical key into a device to log in. Sometimes, physical authentication could include verifying the time and location or verifying biometrics before logging in.

Update and Upgrade Software

Software is always improving and changing, and even if the fundamental code of the software doesn’t undergo extreme change, it’s important to keep software updated, patched, and upgraded as soon as these fixes are available to apply. Updating software can result in a nicer user experience, but more often, it involves fixing newfound bugs and patching up vulnerabilities in the code. If you fail to keep your devices updated, you can leave your entire network susceptible to attack.

Encrypt Your Connection

You can further secure your Internet connection by encrypting the data that goes through data transfer within your network. This can mask sensitive information and disguise any vulnerabilities in your network infrastructure and setup. A VPN is a great tool to obfuscate what’s going on within your network: VPN changes your devices’ IP addresses, encrypts data within and leaving it, and it often comes with a kill switch to shut off your Internet connection if the VPN connection is interrupted or stopped.

Monitor Your System

Further strengthening your Internet security may be worth the investment of a network monitoring tool. If your IoT system has a complex and elaborate network of IoT devices used for business-critical operations, it’s imperative to have an eye on all devices and data flow 24/7. A monitoring system tracks the health of your devices and sends out notifications if anything abnormal is detected, whether that’s a problem with the data flow, an interruption in the Internet connection, or access by an unauthorized party.

Try Segmenting Your Network

As we mentioned earlier, separating your network might be a good idea if some of your devices put your network at more security risk than the others. In segmenting your network, you’re splitting it into separate sub-networks that are mostly independent and isolated from each other. Don’t worry: you can still have the networks communicate if you need them to.

In comparison, a singular network that contains all connected devices, employee devices, and sensitive data transmission is instead protected with a firewall or endpoint protection. But if that firewall or endpoint protection fails, the entire network is at the mercy of the hacker. Thus, it is more prudent to segment your networks and prioritize the security of each network differently, based on the devices and data transfer involved in each network.

Staying Safe Moving Forward

To protect yourself, take any and all measures, even if they involve more investment and time on your part. If you experience a security breach, it can cost more in time and money than if you’d slowly and steadily worked on securing your network all along. At Dogtown Media, we prioritize cybersecurity in our applications from Day 1, and we think that’s a great rule of thumb for your own security needs.

Do you maintain your home’s IoT security? How much time and money do you invest in it to ensure you don’t fall victim to a hacking attempt? Let us know in the comments below!