M2M Technology Forerunner for IOT

Machine-to-machine technology has essentially been the forerunner of most Internet of Things (IoT) things today, be a trend, application or technology. It is not so much of a surprise as M2M technology has been around for years, although not a lot of people realize its full potential yet. The concept of the Internet of things is virtually connecting everything to a network of things, and with less or no human intervention at all. Much has been said about the IoT, and this has been driven quite literally by connected cars technologies.

According to the senior analyst at Berg Insight, Tobias Rybert, M2M technology will soon be available around the globe. And its spread has been widely adopted in various applications in for smart vehicles and connected cars. The M2M market research firm based in Sweden, predicts that the number of mobile network connections for wireless machine-to-machine communication will increase, reaching 213.9 million connections globally by the end of the year. This is 21% increase from the current number of M2M connections as of today. Furthermore, it is expected to grow to 599.7 million in 2019.

Ryberg said that there's a big tipping point for M2M connectivity and we are starting to see connected cars worldwide. The automotive market for M2M represents the largest in the world and Ryberg agrees that M2M applications have become a standard feature in cars, with General Motors incorporating connectivity in all its vehicles. However, Berg Insight further noted this trend is not only seen in cars or connected automobiles. Other equally strong adoption include industrial applications such a fleet management services, point of sale terminals for restaurant billing, smart meters, security and surveillance, among many others. The highest adoption noted among Scandinavian countries is smart metering, which is widely used among households to monitor utilities, followed by connected alarm systems. The top regions embracing this trend are Western Europe, the US and East Asia. Nonetheless, Berg Insight forecasts larger volumes coming from emerging markets such as Brazil, which recently announced government support for the manufacturing of hybrid, electric, smart cars, and credit payment terminals via mobile apps are widely being accepted.

"Overall, the ecosystem is more mature, the big operators all have M2M specialists. It's really becoming a global thing." Ryberg said. Parlacom Brasil, one of the top providers of M2M solutions in Brazil, headed by its CEO and Founder, Clovis Lacerda believes that Brazil is going to be a huge market for M2M.

"There is a lot happening in Brazil. We have M2M terminal tax cuts in place, infrastructure upgrade are being done to accommodate faster data transmission and Brazil just gave a green light on using specific spectrum band for M2M communication. We are opening our doors to bigger opportunities and getting ready to embrace M2M technology's great potential." Lacerda said in a statement when asked what he thought about Berg Insight's forecast. "I have no doubt that Brazil will soon become the M2M network hub in Latin America", the CEO of Parlacom Brasil further added.