M2M, Internet of Things, and the Industrial Internet of Things - an interview with ICON

Does the Channel understand M2M/IoT? How much education is there still to be done? What is your view of the M2M market ?

Mark Shane, ICON Sales Director commented

“Right now M2M/IoT is not understood in the channel. Ask the average reseller if they deploy M2M/IoT solutions and they will probably say no. Ask them what M2M/IoT means and they will most likely quote the examples of a refrigerator ordering milk or home security monitored through a smartphone. These are the popular consumer examples of M2M/IoT. However, in the business field many of ICON’s channel partners have been deploying M2M/IoT solutions for some time, often without realising it, and earning a healthy return from their efforts.”

“For example at its basic level M2M/IoT is about monitoring a sensor or a device and sending a message to a system, a person or some other thing. This is what solutions from our vendor partners Multitone, BlueSky Wireless, and Fusion are built to do and are already doing in the field.”

“The problem is, the terminology M2M/IoT is not understood. The industry needs to do two things. Firstly, it must explain what is included under the umbrella of M2M/IoT. Secondly, it needs to dispel the myth that solutions are futuristic and high tech – consumer solutions probably are, but many business solutions are mundane, available today, and already being used in hospitality, healthcare and manufacturing. These are part of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) which many expect to be one of the biggest opportunities of the next few years and will ultimately dwarf the consumer IoT. ”

 

What type of solutions are currently available and being actively sold by resellers?

In business, M2M/IoT functionality is realised using solutions available from ICON’s vendor partners Multitone, BlueSky Wireless, and Fusion.

Solutions are used in task management: for example in the hospitality sector housekeeping scheduling is linked to Smartphones as room and mini bar status are monitored and building maintenance solutions are increasingly using M2M/IoT to enable a reactive response to problems as they occur.


Other applications include alarm management: this includes fridge and blood alarms as well as patient monitoring support. All these are achievable with the technology from ICON’s vendor partners and the number, variety of applications is expected to increase as users, and reseller partners become more familiar with what can be achieved.

 

How big is the M2M/ IoT opportunity? How will the M2M/ IoT market evolve over the next 12 -18 months and -what is the best strategy for a business wanting to enter this market?

The opportunity for M2M/IoT solutions is growing and will continue to grow.

There is an urgent need in hospitality to manage fire security. In addition, with the availability of enterprise smartphone devices such as Spectralink Pivot the range of business processes being controlled with M2M/IoT is increasing.


ICON’s solution resellers are already benefiting from the M2M/IoT technologies and some have built up a significant installed base in sectors such as hospitality. Opportunities can present themselves either because the client is looking for a fire solution, or out of an opportunity for a value added component of a traditional telecoms sale, or as a solution attached to an enterprise smartphone sale. In either case, the best way for a channel reseller to tap into this lucrative market is to align themselves with a solutions focused distributor such as ICON.

The future of telecommunications platforms or Hosted versus CPE solutions

Cloud based or CPE solutions, which one will prevail?

Mark Shane, Sales Director at ICON says.  

 “Cloud based hosted telephony will not displace CPE PBX telephone solutions in the short, medium or long term.  The last time ICON looked at the market hosted solutions accounted for only around 10% of the total.  That is significant, but given the time hosted solutions have been available it’s not the performance one would expect of a revolutionary displacement solution some claim it to be.”  

"ICON supplies the channel with the Wave CPE IP-PBX solution, but” says Mark “we are not talking up the market just because we supply CPE solutions.  It’s because of our experience in supplying the endpoints market that we are convinced that CPE solutions are here to stay” 

ICON provides endpoint solutions that can be deployed in traditional CPE environments or as a mobility upgrade for the desk endpoint provided with the hosted solution.   Few of the Spectralink solutions are being installed on hosted solutions.  The majority, if not all, are going onto CPE equipment. 

These Spectralink handset solutions can also be deployed in remote offices in a quasi-hosted solution by connecting them remotely to the CPE IP-PBX at head office. However, most companies opt to provide remote office communications using the multi-site capability of the IP-PBX solutions such as the Wave IP-PBX solutions.

“In the channel the popularity of hosted telephony does not seem to be as great as the hype would suggest” says Mark

Microsoft Lync not a meteoric success

 “Microsoft Lync has not been the meteoric success it was claimed it was going to be a few years back.” Says Mark  

ICON distribute the only Microsoft approved voice mobility endpoint solution for Lync solutions and although pundits claim that Microsoft is one of the top 3 suppliers next to Cisco and Avaya, ICON is not seeing this reflected in its sales of Spectralink handsets for Lync.  

 “However,” says Mark “Lync is one of the main solutions in market and the fact the channel has not embraced this solution as fully as it could does not mean that it will not become one of the top channel solutions in the long term.  ICON is already geared up for Lync’s success and can provide and support channel partners with Spectralink handset solutions needed by Lync”

The future is a smart PBX  

Hosted solutions have not traditionally competed with the CPE solutions distributed by ICON and long-term their impact on our Channel Partner CPE business is not expected to change radically from what it is today.  Hosted telephony is not a disruptive technology that will change the landscape forever.  Nevertheless, it does have a place in the market and offers valuable solution for some customers. 

Looking at the market from the perspective of a hosted PBX or CPE PBX is as outdated as looking at an android or IoS handset and seeing only a telephone.  Like cell phones, PBX’s have morphed into platforms for running business apps and delivering solutions.  The future is not one of hybrid PBX solutions. It is a future of “smart” PBX’s.   Smart PBX’s, such as Wave IP, which, amongst other things, integrate with cloud based or on premises based business applications,  will manage the communications services of your road warriors and report on the performance of your advertising.

You can see this happening today.  The “smart” PBX Wave IP solution is used by US automotive dealerships as an adjunct to their DMS/CRM solutions.  With it, they track the performance of advertising campaigns, manage the workload on the parts and service departments and much more – they also use it to make calls. 

Market Report - PBX & Communications Platforms

Unified Communications PBX is now a mature product and those vendors who are going to offer a UC solution already have an established and proven product line. Competition is now moving to developing sector specific solutions and offering extended support services. Leading this move is Vertical Communications who hold a strong position in the global retail sector and have set new standards in the market by providing 5-year warranty on solutions hardware.

It is the customer facing business sectors that are hungry for the UC applications and ICON believes that throughout 2015 growth in the UC market will come from the customer-facing businesses. 

Retail -- Retail is a key market for UC solutions such as Wave IP. Customers in large global department stores have invested heavily in UC solutions. Likewise, garden centres, automotive dealers and other customer centric business are all seeing the benefits of the UC applications. 

Automotive -- Vertical Communications, the makers of the UC solution Wave IP, has launched and presented an automotive focused solution at the 2015 NADA the National Automotive Dealers Association in the US and in 2014 teamed up with Spectralink wireless to offer a UC wireless solution for retail and other customers. This sector focused solution strategy is expected to continue throughout 2015 as vendors of UC solutions look to find and dominate a sector.

Not surprisingly, the customer facing sectors of retail, hospitality and automotive are the big opportunities for UC solutions such as Wave IP. However, what and why the customers are buying UC based solutions is most interesting. 

Benefits of UC -- The ICON sales team report that often the reason a customer invests in UC based solution Wave IP is because it delivers the ability to track and manage customer communications, links with back office applications and provides the ability to link mobile users with the business applications. 

UC Applications -- The leading vendors have provided the core UC applications as standard to all desk handsets by for several years now. Vendors such as vertical Communications are now providing these applications to the mobile extension be that a cell phone or a business dedicated Wi-Fi handset. Solutions such as Viewpoint mobile delivers all the enterprise UC applications, including call recording, to the mobile handset giving the road warrior the same communications resource as their desk based colleagues. 

Wireless Solutions and how to sell them

Driven largely by the move to Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) and the absence of any uniform 3G/4G coverage in the UK market for wireless connectivity in the workplace (which is anytime, anyplace, anywhere) is expanding rapidly and represents a great opportunity for resellers. It’s not just about creating hot spots and there are some great applications out there that really build margin and lock in the customer for the reseller.

How distributors can help resellers expand in to this market and build new revenue streams

Selling wireless connectivity is all about providing the infrastructure and endpoints to enable business solutions. This solutions driven market is expanding rapidly with real time messaging applications, lone worker, health and safety and day-to-day business solutions driving growth. Moving into this market means selling the solution, the business benefits and the business improvement that can be gained from a total solution. 

Channel partners who have traditionally sold wireless connectivity for voice applications are often unfamiliar with the business problems and needs of a sector and the solutions and applications available to help solve these and enhance business. In addition, they may find themselves competing with VARS who specialises in delivering sector specific solutions. Hospitality and retail are classic examples where specialism counts. These are large markets requiring some specialist sector knowledge and solutions. 

That is where choosing to work with the right distributor matters. Bringing a distributor, such as ICON, in at the early stages of a bid can mean the difference between winning and loosing. Value added distributors, such as ICON, with extensive knowledge of the sector and the available solutions can add the knowledge and experience to the bid that would otherwise be missing.

Often this experience and knowledge of how the sector works can be the key to unlocking an opportunity. It is knowing how the solution influences the KPI (key performance indicators) of a business that can win the bid. VAR distributors such as ICON understand how by integrating solutions such as voice, real-time messaging and alarm monitoring across a wireless network can influence the KPI of a business and how this can be used to open up the bid to the reseller.

What applications are selling well and where?

The popularity of an application depends on the sector being targeted. In client facing, businesses such as healthcare where staff can be exposed to the dangers of physical abuse staff safety solutions are popular. To deploy such a solution requires a handset that can support the solution with features such as an emergency call button, man down sensor, running sensor and no movement sensor. The problem for many businesses is that many BYOD devices do not support these features. 

In service focused industries, such as hospitality, solutions that support guest service and safety are popular. Typically these may be solutions for pre-alarm warnings, guest service call and staff task scheduling.

What constitutes a BYOD checklist for wireless solutions providers?

The key and most important check is will the infrastructure and endpoints support the applications you want to run now and in the future, deliver these at a long-term cost you can afford, and provide the opportunity for future expansion. 

Will 4G access impact this wireless market?

4G is a wireless connectivity technology that supports mobile handsets. It will have significance if the handsets have some advantage in delivering the solutions needed in the workplace. The typical BYOD mobile handset is not suited to long term continuous use in the workplace. 

The mobile handset is not sufficiently robust to survive sustained use in full-on operational environments. In comparison, the purpose built android-based handsets, such as the PIVOT from Spectralink, can deliver everything a mobile phone is able to and is also withstand the knocks and scraps of the workplace.

Mobile Distribution

Typical applications we provide are the UC application for integrating the mobile with the business telephone and real time messaging solutions which integrate with mobiles.

In this respect we believe that 2015 will see a growth in demand for mobile UC applications as businesses integrate their mobiles into the enterprise telephone system. Several vendors are already providing these applications notable amongst them is Vertical Communications which provides its Viewpoint Mobile UC application for businesses. UC applications such as Viewpoint deliver all the enterprise UC applications to the mobile handset giving the "road warrior" the same communications resource as their office based colleagues. 

We also expect a continued growth in real time messaging applications to mobiles. These M2M like solutions are increasingly being deployed in the hospitality sector to monitor BMS, PMS solutions such as 

1. heating/air conditioning monitoring, 
2. fire/intrusion/door/elevator stop alarms, 
3. integration with hotel applications 
4. emergency buttons, 
5. information broadcast, 
6. tech-alarms, room & mini bar status

Unified Communications for the SME

 An interview with Mark Shane of ICON

Is the concept of unified communications difficult to understand? Why is that and what can we do about it?

Unified Communication is industry speak and probably not understood by the average SME.  But, asks Mark do they need to understand it.  Do you need to know the terminology used in an industry before you can make an informed judgement about the solution to buy. All the customer needs to understand is that the box in front of them solves their problem and will deliver the productivity, resources or business outcome they want. 

The problem says Mark is that in many cases the customer is unaware that there are solutions that can do this.  There are several reasons for this.  Firstly, the industry has not been good at educating the market about these benefits.  Secondly, often the customer is not sold anything but a plain old telephone system either because the solution offered is not UC capable or because the sales person is more comfortable selling a traditional telephone solution rather than a business solution.

ICON has supported many of its channel partners in competitive bids where this has been the case and in most cases has successfully upsold the customer.  It helps to have a versatile UC solution such as the Wave IP to offer but in all cases, the sale has been won by putting together an offer that understands the needs of the business and proposes a solution that focusses on the business and not on the management of telephone calls.  In all cases, the concept of Unified Communications per se has added no value to the negotiations.

Should vendors produce an SME Edition of unified communications applications?

Mark is emphatic when he says that there is no need for the industry to produce an SME UC solution.  These already exist.  Solutions are available which are affordable by the SME and which deliver all that an SME needs and more.  The Vertical Wave IP business solution is one such solution.  It scales from an SME to an enterprise solution and has been deployed by an SME with as few as two handsets.  It was chosen because the business needed the capability to record calls and a Wave IP UC solution offered the best value solution.  

Are end users better served by single vendor solutions or by a best of breed mix of third party applications?

Third party applications have a place in the market but says Mark these are usually deployed when the customer needs highly advance features.  
 

Single vendor solutions are able to deliver all that the typical SME or enterprise customer  requires and can do this at significantly better value than multiple vendor solutions.  That is, of course, provided the single vendor solution like the Vertical Communications UC solution includes as standard all the applications needed.  If the applications are available only at additional cost then the situation changes completely.  
 

Single box, single vendor solutions such as the Wave IP that include as standard the core business applications needed by the SME or the enterprise have significant advantage for the customer.  The initial investment is low, there is no solution integration as there is with multiple vendor solutions, no need to take out multiple maintenance agreements and they come with the reassurance that when an application is upgraded it will continue to work with the others.