$50 Billion
by 2017
Forbes reports that
Big Data will grow
to $50B by 2017,
representing close to
a 60% yearly increase.
50 Billion Nodes
by 2020
According to Cisco,
80 things per second
are connecting to
the Internet, and by
2020, 250 things will
connect each second.
50 billion things will
be connected to the
Internet by 2020.
Increasing
Volume and
Velocity
46% of businesses
consider volume of
information to be
their primary data
challenge.
The physical world itself is becoming an information
system. Sensors in physical objects from smartphones
to manufacturing equipment to traffic cameras
are being networked. The vast streaming data they
generate is changing the way businesses think
about information and how to use it. The potential
is tremendous.
Empowering the Internet
of Things with Adaptive
Stream Computing
“The Internet of Things will be the biggest point of
leverage for IT in the next 10 years, with $14 trillion in
profits from that one concept alone.”
– John Chambers, CEO, Cisco
• Adaptive Stream Computing will
make vast data stores and streams
useful with solutions that are easy
to integrate and control, providing
significant business insight and
competitive advantage.
• Companies that harness Big Data
in real-time to capture and act
on information as it is created
will eclipse their competition and
transform their industries.
• Solution providers that integrate
resident intelligence and control
with centralized processing power
will dominate their industries
by enabling their customers to
achieve more than they ever
thought possible.
Transforming Industries
Information Technology is disrupting business models and creating new opportunities in a series of dramatic waves. We are currently seeing the effects of the information revolution progressing from simple analytics to Big Data. The next step will be the integration of Stream Computing, culminating in The Internet of Things, and its economic disruption of entire industries.
The last decade offered the first information revolution. With more information at their fingertips, managers became able to make more informed decisions than ever before. Typically, business information was extracted and analyzed from structured central repositories and served up in standard reports or dashboards.
Recently we have seen this model stretched and revolutionized by the need to accommodate vast levels of data. This shift to ‘Big Data’ technologies has been gaining momentum over the last 3-5 years and is accelerating.
The Internet of Things
The present phase of the information revolution is poised to be as transformative as the last ones were. The world of ‘things’ is becoming inter-connected – everything from cell phones to motion sensors are generating vast quantities of real-time information, and businesses will need to harness that informa-tion-as-power to thrive in an increasingly competitive landscape.
Stream Computing
Stream computing analyzes and acts on data as it is created at network nodes. These nodes may be anything from Internet feeds to oxygen monitors, cell phone relays to assembly line control valves.
Stream Computing is about to meet the Big Data challenge head-on. Consider the Twitter ‘storm’ analyzing millions of tweets to cross-reference connections and route trends in real-time, or Amazon.com tracking popularity of devices and cross-referencing past purchases to tailor offerings in real-time.
Importantly, real-time data models are about to move from the virtual world to the physical one. By taking information from sensors on physical objects and acting on them instantly, utilities are building out systems that re-route power within milliseconds upon outages, while the transportation industry is looking at ways to reroute shipping based on GPS, weather, and real-time traffic data.
Completing the Picture:
Adaptive Stream Computing
Stream Computing of Big Data from the Internet of Things will need Adaptive Characteristics. To be useful, systems will need to provide:
• Flexibility to easily create and manage rules that empower managers rather than data scientists, to the point of automated feedback and learning;
• Extensibility to blend centralized, decentralized, and hybrid data models in and out of the cloud transparently;
• Resiliency to retain transactional integrity in real-time systems under the most demanding conditions; and • The ability to evolve in real-time to execute changes
automatically and transparently based on changing conditions in the data stream.
Distributed Models
For maximum business value, Adaptive Stream Computing systems will use several learning and feedback approaches for different types of networks, different parts of the network, and different elements within them, including:
• Human to machine rules based logic;
• Human to machine supervised pattern recognition feedback; and
• Automated machine to machine pattern recognition adaptation ‘on the fly.'
Above all, systems will need robust error-checking and recovery capabilities to retain transactional integrity.
Industry Development
As businesses strive for the advantages of big data, focus will shift away from the solved problems of data storage and acquisition, to the more complex problems of advanced data management. New approaches enabled by Adaptive Stream Computing will:
• Create transparency, discover needs, expose variability and improve performance;
• Enhance or even replace human decisions with embedded automated and semi-automated logic; and
• Innovate new business models, products and services. This advancement will be generated in the context of widely blended networks that include everything from machine to machine communication with zero latency (edge processing) to batch systems of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data in the cloud.
Different industries will drive towards this advancement at different rates, with the most innovative leading the way. As industries mature, the most competitive participants will leverage Big Data and Adaptive Stream Computing in creative ways for significant gain.
Empowering The Internet of Things with Adaptive Stream Computing
IDC estimates that by 2020, over 400 billion transactions will be performed on the Internet per day.
How BIG is ‘Big Data’?
Facebook stores and
mines over 30 petabytes
(30 million gigabytes or
30 billion megabytes) in
its systems continuously.
Twitter manages 175
million tweets per day
from over 450 million
accounts.
Walmart
Walmart handles and
archives more than
1 million customer
transactions per hour.
Handheld Devices
Handheld devices
account for tremendous
traffic: over 5 billion
people call, text,
browse and buy from
smartphones.
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The Big Data concept will progress
from simply managing data at
rest to managing and acting on
data in motion.
“As advanced technology becomes more and more prevalent, we have to
engage in analysis and diagnosis . . . even more intensively or risk being
swamped by the data we generate.”
– Peter Drucker
Companies that can effectively
act on real-world information
will garner a major competitive
advantage. Those that harness Big
Data in real-time to capture and
act on information as it is created
will eclipse their competition and
transform their industries.
The Opportunity
Adaptive Stream Computing is poised to make Big Data actionable by businesses. Technology companies that can help their clients transform themselves, and their industries, will experience dramatic growth.
According to Gartner, most verticals are already investing heavily in Big Data and Analytics. With the pressures of product launch windows and time to market shortening in an ever-accelerating global market, it makes sense that real-time business data is being recognized for its ability to engender much greater efficiency and help business managers create smarter systems and make more informed decisions. At the same time, the tremendous continued growth of online business is helping change expectations in all sectors. Specifically, traditional businesses are eager to replicate online successes. Amazon’s disruption ofthe publishing industry, and Apple’s revolutionizing media sales have been important success stories hinged on the tremendous value of Big Data and Adaptive Stream Computing. Traditional businesses are hungry for this type of growth, and aware that if they do not take active steps to embrace Big Data and Adaptive Stream Computing, their competition will.
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Winning in the Adaptive
Stream Computing Space
Industries are gradually gaining awareness of their need for not only the means to manage vast quantities of business data, but also the means to make it useful in the context of distributed networks and machine-to-machine communications. They are learning quickly that useful systems will:
• Empower Business Managers, not Technicians – The US Bureau of Statistics predicts a shortage of 100,000-200,000 IT workers with ‘deep analytical talent’, and another 1.5 million workers with extensive quantitative skills, by 2018. Technology companies that want to gain traction and dominance in the immediate term will need to empower managers directly without the need for Data Scientists to act as intermediaries.
• Manage Active Content – Big Data is just the beginning. Active streams of data generated from the Internet of Things will create vast volumes of data at high velocity. Successful systems will manage transactional data from various incoming systems to make meaningful decisions in automatic and semi-automatic ways.
• Integrate Edge Computing with Centralized
Intelligence – Node intelligence must provide fast response times between points in order to make Stream Computing meaningful. Offerings that want to dominate this market will manage structured, unstructured and semi-structured data to automatically make decisions in real-time when necessary, while leveraging the power, economy, and efficiency of centralized servers for conditions that are better served by that model for economic or practical reasons.
“Big data will help to create new growth opportunities and entirely
new categories of companies, such as those that aggregate and analyze
industrial data. Many of these will be companies that sit in the middle of
large information flows where data about products and services, buyers
and suppliers, and consumer preferences and intent can be captured
and analyzed.”
– McKinsey Quarterly Report
“…many companies are (already) implementing new tools for collection,
analysis and presentation of treasures buried in big data -- and are
reporting impressive ROI as a result. Predictive analytics has jumped
to the front of the field as one of the most promising areas of practical
application.”
– Doug Gonsalves, Innovation Insights, WIRED Magazine
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“Big data is going to transform
business. It’s not about how, it’s
about when.”
– Patricia Florissi, Vice President and Global Chief
Technology Officer, EMC
Timing the Market
The opportunity is here today. Large companies are positioning themselves to participate in the Big Data and Analytics space with key acquisitions, and the valuation multiples are reaching double digits of revenue. Examples include:
• IBM acquiring Visimo,
• VMware acquiring Cetas Software,
• Teradata acquiring (merging with) Aster Data , and • EMC acquiring Greenplum.
Investment companies are also putting skin in the game, with more than 20 major investments announced in 2013, including Applied Predictive Technologies raising $100M, Intel’s
investment in Revolution Analytics, and Hortonworks’ $50M Big Data investment.
Overall, investment capital in Big Data technologies in the first half of 2013 has increased by more than 87 percent of the total in all of 2012, and the trend is expected to continue into 2014 and beyond.
Where will this happen?
The need for transactional Big Data is recognized in virtually every industry that has supply chain, automated control, or rapid transactional needs. The Internet of Things (also called The Internet of Everything) will collect streaming data from cars, appliances, smartphones, monitoring sensors, and much more:
• Warehousing and Shipping will track goods down to the individual unit.
• Manufacturing will detect problems proactively to address problems before they occur.
• Retail will adjust prices on the fly based on instant sales data.
• Transit will reconstruct routes and schedules in real-time.
• Military and Aerospace will manage and deploy resources based on changing conditions in the field.
Market Size
IDC estimates the global Big Data market to be over $6.5B in 2013, rising to $17B in 2015 and then well over $48B by 2018. JMP Securities anticipates that by 2021, Big Data will account for fully 13% of IT spending globally.
According to Cisco, 50 billion things will be connected by 2020. Over the next 10 years, the ‘Internet of Everything’ will create $14.4 trillion of “value at stake,” the potential bottom-line value derived by harnessing this data.
About Bit Stew Systems Inc.
& Grid Director™
Bit Stew Systems Inc. is a world-leading provider of integrated, real-time network operations solutions for the utility industry. Bit Stew’s flagship product, Grid Director, is revolutionizing the way the utility industry deploys, operates, secures and optimizes smart grids globally. Grid Director’s game-changing approach offers customers an in-depth, interactive and real-time view of their smart grids enabling them to make more agile and informed decisions that elevate their business operations. Grid Director provides real-time analytics, dynamic event management, and quick and easy integration with both IT and OT systems and applications.
Supporting both IP-based and proprietary networks, Grid Director is ideal for delivering an enterprise view into large disparate device based networks, while offering predictive analytics, pattern recognition, and complex event correlation. Grid Director is currently in production at several large utilities in the United States, Canada, and Australia – and is rapidly becoming the global software standard for electric, gas, and water utilities. The application is built to concurrently manage a network of connected devices and has proven scalability to over one billion end devices – making it an ideal platform for managing the Internet of Things.
Founded in 2005, Bit Stew Systems is a privately held company that is headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia with offices in Mountain View, California; Toronto, Ontario; and
Melbourne, Australia. Bit Stew is strongly positioned to execute on its rapid growth strategy that involves both geographic expansion, and movement into adjacent utility sectors, further establishing itself as a leader in the smart grid network technology market.
Looking Ahead
The unique and modular approach used by Bit Stew Systems provides agility and relevance for all kinds of industries that are beginning to understand the power of Big Data and how to best leverage it with dynamic control through Adaptive Stream Computing in the Internet of Things. As such, Bit Stew Systems is in a unique position with Grid Director:
• Big Data and Stream Computing are fully integrated by design, rather than being bolt-on adaptations for traditional software platforms;
• The ‘Data Scientist’ is integrated into product: decision makers can set rules and metrics with natural language rather than program interfaces, or they can have the system teach itself within user-specified parameters; • A Fit for Purpose architecture does the job that’s needed by
the customer without extras that may never be used, and the flexibility to add functionality on the fly provides clear paths for growth; and
• End-point intelligence for autonomous machine-to-machine communication, embedded analytics and action is built into the product and integrates with a seamless cloud offering.
“We expect companies that were
born digital to accomplish things
that business executives could only
dream of a generation ago, but in
fact the use of Big Data has the
potential to transform traditional
businesses as well. It may offer
them even greater opportunities
for competitive advantage.”
– Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson,
Harvard Business Review
Empowering The Internet of Things with Adaptive Stream Computing
Ensuring Success
Bit Stew Systems has a thoughtful strategy to ensure continued success as it adapts its platform to new industries with:
• A clear value proposition, the ability to prototype quickly, and a modular approach that will provide quick proofs-of-concept to industry players. This easy integration will also provide a thin edge on which the company can sell a core ability at the outset, and leave the opportunity for a fuller offering open to the future.
• Partnerships, integration with common platforms, and targeted hiring or acquisitions that will create environments where the company is considered an incumbent rather than a newcomer.
• A flexible and responsive strategy that will prevent over-investment with a continued focus on the capability for the technology to adapt quickly to new directions will ensure that opportunities can be exploited.
With a clear path forward informed by a well-developed and adaptable strategy, Bit Stew Systems is in a unique position to deliver on the tremendous promise of the Internet of Things with Adaptive Stream Computing.
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Bit Stew Systems Inc.
Learn more at: www.bitstew.com
Follow us on Twitter: @grid_director
BIT STEW and GRID DIRECTOR are trademarks or registered trademarks of Bit Stew Systems Inc.
About the Authors
David Sussman (MBA, PMP) and Tony Mauro (P. Eng) are the principals at Sussman and Mauro, a marketing strategy firm specializing in industry analysis, strategy development, and communication in the high-tech sector.
The Sussman and Mauro team have extensive experience, extending from the energy sector to telecommunications, cloud services, and related industries.
Together, Mr. Sussman and Mr. Mauro bring over 30 years of experience to bear on business problems. In their employment and contracting careers, they have served a wide array of companies including TELUS, BC Hydro, BCTC, Nexon, Creo, Kodak, Corix, and several others. Their approach includes technical, strategic, and marketing perspectives, enabling them to bring a very unique value proposition to their clients and partners. Selected References: http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/business_technology/big_data_the_next_frontier_for_innovation http://www.ibmbigdatahub.com/blog/big-data-analytics-will-permeate-internet-things http://www.wired.com/insights/2013/07/without-api-management-the-internet-of-things-is-just-a-big-thing/ http://www.economist.com/node/15557443 http://hbr.org/2012/10/big-data-the-management-revolution/ar/1 http://wikibon.org/wiki/v/Big_Data_Vendor_Revenue_and_Market_Forecast_2012-2017 http://share.cisco.com/internet-of-things.html http://www.forbes.com/sites/siliconangle/2012/02/17/big-data-is-big-market-big-business/
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