On Monday, IDC Retail Insights published a new report — Business Strategy: Developing IoT Use Cases for Retail — which evaluates the current and future state of Internet of Things (IoT) technology in retail.
As MMW has covered in no shortage of detail in recent years, the market for IoT is growing — and fast.
According to the report, some IoT technologies have matured and others are still being nurtured, but the use cases are well defined.
Cloud- and mobile-based solutions improve return on investment (ROI), reducing the barriers to implementation and speeding adoption. In fact, almost 10% of all IoT investment in 2013 was made by retailers, and by 2017, annual investments will surpass $466 million.
IDC’s Leslie Hand, the report’s author, says “Consumer demand for convenience, product availability, and personalized and contextualized interactions will drive retailers to adopt multiple IoT technologies. This beckons a fresh evaluation of IoT opportunities in retail, as the challenges diminish and the consumer demand for interactive, engaging, and convenient retail experience trump any hesitance to invest in IoT.”
