Press Release - New study from Machina Research maps the DNA of M2M

While not quite the undertaking of Crick and Watson, understanding the make-up of M2M applications is vitally important for any company wanting to segment this diverse market and understand its opportunity

Machina Research today announced the publication of a new study mapping the DNA of M2M applications. The results of the study have been published as an online tool which will allow companies that are interested in selling connected products and services to identify the particular range of applications that will benefit from their capabilities.

M2M applications are incredibly diverse, and a one-size-fits-all approach will never work. Understanding the make-up of the applications characteristics is key to understanding the market opportunity. Author Jim Morrish explains: “The data streams produced by a connected home weather station and a smart electricity meter may look similar but there are several key differences. One is that smart metering data drives billing, whereas information gleaned from a home weather station primarily exists for the purposes of entertainment.” The technology, the device maker, and the service provider able to support the smart meter and those able to support the weather station are very different.

In the study, Machina Research identifies the 27 key characteristics that define an M2M application, related to such diverse factors as security, billing, device integration, geographical coverage, analytics, access to power, and application complexity. The true value of understanding the requirements of each application is the use it in conjunction with a highly granular market forecast. This allows users to identify the scale of the opportunity presented by the applications of a particular type. The underlying Machina Research market forecasts cover 180 different M2M applications, the most granular M2M market forecasts in the world. We attribute one of 104 complexity ratings for each of the resulting 4,860 DNA strand/ M2M application pairs to produce the results. Morrish comments: “As you’ve probably guessed, it’s been a pretty complicated undertaking and we’ve had to build a new web interface at www.machinaresearch.com/dna just to adequately communicate the findings.”

One result of the application of this type of granular segmentation is to open up more opportunity for smaller niche players. Morrish points out that “We expect that the ‘niche horizontal’ perspective on M2M markets will become a dominant theme. Up until now the M2M market has been dominated by industry behemoths. As smaller players enter the market they will naturally look for ways to differentiate by developing specific capabilities. The mass market phase of M2M (and IoT) adoption will be characterised by this more differentiated approach.”

About the DNA of M2M Study

The DNA of M2M Study is available via a web interface on our website, along with an explanatory Research Note. Within the study we have assessed each of the 27 identified DNA characteristics for each of the 180 different M2M applications that we forecast, and attributed one of 104 complexity ratings for each of the resulting 4,860 DNA strand/ M2M application pairs. We have termed these underlying characteristics of M2M applications to be the ‘DNA of M2M’ applications, and we have developed this interactive web interface to allow you to view the M2M opportunity from the perspective of your key strengths and capabilities.

The web interface allows users to examine the characteristics of each DNA strand, analyse any strand combination, and understand which applications are the most significant for any combination. The tool is illustrated below:

Subscribers to Machina Research’s Advisory Service can access the DNA of M2M online tool here: http://machinaresearch.com/dna. The explanatory Research Note is available in the Reports section of our website.

About Machina Research

Machina Research is a technology research and consulting firm focused on the emerging opportunities associated with new forms of connected device. We provide market intelligence and strategic insight to help our clients maximise opportunities from these rapidly emerging markets. If your company is a mobile network operator, device vendor, infrastructure vendor, service provider or potential end user in the M2M, IoT, Big Data or mobile broadband space, we can help.

Contact

For further comments or more information on this press release, please contact: Jim Morrish, Chief Research Officer, Machina Research (jim.morrish@machinaresearch.com)