Infographics: The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT): Are Companies Ready For It?

The Visual Capitalist has a dandy infographics on the Internet of Things (IoT) and may be one of the trends to look forward to.

We’ve all heard about how the consumer version of the internet of things (IoT) will impact our lives. Smart devices in our homes, cars, and cities are already beginning to send and receive data to each other, allowing for unprecedented integration with consumer technologies.

But the implications of this revolution of connectivity extend way behind just smartphones and your home. In fact, it’s about to be applied on an industrial scale to everything from aerospace to mining in ways that people can hardly imagine.

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) will pull data from millions of tiny sensors on every piece of industrial equipment fathomable. Companies will harness this data in real-time to create insights and efficiencies on a crazy scale: GE estimates it will help to generate a $10-$15 trillion increase in global GDP over the next 20 years.

BUT CAN COMPANIES HANDLE THE IIOT?

While this all sounds great in theory, the reality is that the transition to a useful IIoT is going to be an ongoing challenge. Very different types of data need to be captured and integrated, and companies will need to find ways to turn huge amounts of data into focused insights.

Bit Stew Systems, a data integration platform with investors such as Cisco and GE Ventures, recently commissioned a survey of top IT execs to see if their respective companies were ready for the IIoT.

The survey found that only 30% of companies are currently early adopters of the IIoT, while the other 70% are still in the planning phase. Perhaps more importantly, top IT execs identified the potential barriers to their companies adopting the IIoT, as well as the opportunities that the IIoT can unlock for their operations:

Opportunities

80% of senior IT executives view improving operating efficiency and uptime as the top benefits that IIoT will bring. Other benefits identified: improved operating costs, better uptime, improved asset performance management, and knowledge transfer in the workplace.

Larger organizations (1,000+ employees) found improving uptime to be a more compelling benefit than smaller organizations. 70% say that having proven capabilities for data modeling and mapping were more important for a IIoT platform than any other feature.

Barriers to Adoption

64% of senior IT executives said that integrating data from disparate sources and formats, and extracting business value from that data, is the biggest challenge the IIoT presents.

Meanwhile, 36% say limited access to the right skills and expertise is the problem.

Larger organizations (1,000+ employees) were more likely to struggle with traditional database management and analytics tools (34% vs 12%).

87% say that the overwhelming volume and veracity of data will result in losing valuable business insights.

33% say that businesses without a data management strategy will become marginalized, obsolete, or disappear.

WHY IS INDUSTRIAL DATA SO COMPLICATED?

Industrial data comes from a variety of source types and is often messy. Combine this with its complexity, and that it comes in massive volumes and varied frequencies, and the situation is quite a quagmire for any aspiring adopter.

To enter a truly connected world where data about everything is analyzed instantaneously on an industrial scale, we must first solve these issues around data. It’s only then that the IIoT will show its true potential for business.

Change is time consuming process. The IoT will be no different.

Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

Infographic: The October Flash Crash in the British Pound

The Visual Capitalist chronicled the recent crash in British Pound through an infograph. They write:

We all know that software is eating the world.

For better or worse, that statement applies to the financial world as well. It is said today that 75% of all financial market volume is automated, though there are lower and higher estimates out there depending on the report.

The bottom line is that algorithmic trading is the dominant market player – and this has benefits and drawbacks for average investors. On the upside, markets are less volatile and presumably more rational because they are driven by computers instead of fallible humans.

On the other hand? Sometimes algos just go rogue and do something unpredictable.

When the British pound flash crashed earlier this month, it was exactly this latter thing that happened.

EXPLAINING THE OCTOBER FLASH CRASH IN THE BRITISH POUND

The following infographic from Top 10 Forex VPS shares a play-by-play breakdown of how the British pound crashed a whopping 8% in just two minutes.

It’s interesting because it helps give a sense of how the piping works behind these trading algorithms. It’s also a cautionary tale of algos gone wild, showing how market momentum can be swung in a particular direction even without your average market participants being involved

While the infographic rationalizes the GBP's flash crash as mainly a combination of algorithm and "Brexit" in the below infographics, there must be more than meets the eye.

First, the infographic, then my comment after...
 

Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

It's not  just the GBP, even the yuan has been significantly dropping. Currency turmoil has emerged around the world. 

Besides, the GBP's flash crash must not be seen in isolation, accounts of flash crashes seem to be crescendoing.

As I recently wrote in my prudent investor newsletter blog (closed to public)

Although one may posit that PBOC may have allowed the yuan fall, the yuan’s conditions seem to have even reflected on the British pound (GBP). The GBP experienced a flash crash last October 7 (Investopedia October 7). Apparently, the flash crash wasn’t an anomaly because the British pound fell by another 2% this week. Against a basket of currency, the British pound has fallen to 168 year lows (Irish Times October 12)!

And as I have noted here, rising accounts or frequency of amplified volatility has metastasized into a global financial trend. [Phisix 7,100: 2Q GDP Hype, One Day Crashes Have Hardly Been Isolated Events August 31, 2015]

ONE day panics have not usually signified an isolated incident.

One day panics are usually followed by another crash, or a string of crashes or by an eventual weakening or a combination thereof.

A Bloomberg article enumerates some of the recent crashes (October 7): May 6, 2010: U.S. Stocks, Oct. 15, 2014: U.S. Treasuries, Aug. 24, 2015: U.S. Stocks, Aug. 25, 2015: New Zealand Dollar and May 31, 2016: China Index Futures.

The roster excludes crashes by the Swiss stock market (January 2015) as consequence to the unpegging of the euro-swiss franc (BBC January 2015), as well as the stock market crash in Thailand (December 2014).

The point here is that the growing frequency of financial market tremors seems likely to prognosticate the imminence of a major global financial market earthquake…sooner than later.

Charts of the Day: US Restaurant Recession

Writes Shelly Banjo at the Bloomberg's Gadfly:

New unit growth among restaurant chains has outpaced population gains in the U.S. for years, boosting supply at a time when consumers are pulling back on restaurant spending, according to a recent presentation from research firm Hedgeye.

Restaurant sales growth across the industry hasn't been positive since April, raising fears of an impending "restaurant recession." To keep customers coming in, chains are boosting discounts, even though labor and other costs are rising, and that's eating profits.

Meanwhile, consumers are increasingly dining at home, with food from grocery stores or meal-delivery kits from companies such as Blue Apron and Hello Fresh. Underscoring this shift in preference, Darden said to-go orders and catering rose by 20 percent in the latest quarter from a year earlier, making up 11 percent of sales.

Online sales help margins because they tend to be higher-priced orders and require less labor -- although they deprive Darden of check-boosting alcohol sales. Darden said it would keep pushing online ordering and that it was experimenting with delivery services. 

Writing on the wall for the global "consumer economy"?