The mobile consumer IoT market will present a $6.6 billion opportunity for service providers by 2023, according to ABI Research.
It shapes up to be a complicated sector, however. “Consumer IoT is a nascent and fragmented market where connectivity is an essential enabler,” Pablo Tomasi Senior Analyst at ABI Research said in a press release. For these reasons, wireless providers “can play a key role in driving the growth of the consumer IoT market from tracking applications to the connected car – direct to consumer (D2C).” The providers, he said, “must find the right balance between their traditional connectivity centered business model and the need to grow the market and develop new use cases.”
Mobile Consumer IoT Market
Tomasi says that tools are available. Wireless providers, he said, “have all the technology and expertise needed at their disposal from NB-IoT and LTE-M to eSIM and should act quickly to shape the direction of the market. For instance, by launching consumer IoT products with flexible business models, possibly bundled with current smartphones and data plans, [providers] can help to generate customer demand, which in turn will attract more OEMs to produce consumer IoT devices.”
The bottom line, however, is that providers have not been aggressive in exploring this potentially lucrative market, ABI says. There are exceptions. Vodafone has been active in the consumer IoT space and has offerings in multiple countries under the “V by Vodafone” branding. Another example is Telia. It has partnered with parking company EasyPark, insurance firm Folksam and roadside assistance company Viking to offer a number of services.
The “UnTelco for Consumer IoT: Telco Opportunities and Market Activities”report says that providers such as Comcast and Telefonica are capable of excelling in this market because of their positions in providing connectivity to homes and smart home applications such as security and automation. Comcast has developed a smart home business through the home security business. Telefonica is offering an AI virtual assistant in its Aura smart home offering. These can be good platforms for entry into the consumer IoT sector.