UNLOCKING THE EDGE

A South African innovator in Internet of Things (IoT) technology, IoT.nxt, is the country’s top IoT innovator that uses IoT apps and technology to solve business problems, according to MTN 2017 Internet of Things Awards.

IoT technology is transforming the world of business, retail, heavy industry, and our personal lives.

Research from Gartner has estimated that there will be over 6.4 billion connected things in use in 2016, increasing to around 20.8 billion by 2020. Business will need to adapt their practices on a mass scale to accommodate the deluge of connected solutions.

Now in its second year, the MTN IoT Awards, hosted by MTN, attracts entries from various start-ups with IoT solutions already being deployed in South Africa and across the globe, and the ceremony, held at Sandton Convention Centre, aims to encourage local developers to create exciting, original IoT solutions for the South African market.

IoT.nxt was awarded the top accolade of Overall Winner at the second MTN Internet of Things award and walked away with the Best Commercial Solution award.

“This is a great achievement for our team. We are thrilled to receive this recognition and grateful for the acknowledgement for the company. It is an endorsement for what we are doing and celebrates what we have achieved in 18 months,” Nico Steyn, CEO, said.

“There is a revolution underway in business. Not only in South Africa but across the entire continent. Companies must adapt and change to remain competitive. IoT will deliver massive benefits to any company in any industry. This technology can deliver exponential value, as we have already seen in the many industries we are involved with,” he said.

“For instance, local mining companies are re-inventing themselves to remain relevant in a highly competitive global industry and are already seeing the benefits of the rapid deployment of new technology.”

IoT.nxt is South Africa’s fast-growing innovator in IoT technology.

The IoT firm, which was founded by Steyn and partners Bertus Jacobs and Terje Moen in Centurion at the end of 2015, will open its first fully-fledged office in Europe in The Hague, the Netherlands, in July this year. This follows its associate office established in London in January this year and now firmly starts the company’s global expansion. For more read: South Africa’s IoT.nxt sets up shop in The Netherlands

“The award project shows the incredible skills available in South Africa and we are proud that our team was considered the best. The best businesses are built through employing the best people and we have a great team. Part of our success is having the right backing. Our investment partners, Talent10 Holdings, are walking this road with us and enabled team IoT.nxt’s innovation culture to thrive,” Steyn added.

According to MTN Business Group Executive, Oliver Fortuin, the major strength of the IoT.nxt framework is that the solution is technology agnostic, which overcomes the challenge of connecting all devices or systems.

“This enables a company to deploy best of breed technologies with little or no disruption to the company’s current operations, allowing businesses to action an Internet of Things strategy quickly and easily,” Fortuin said at the presentation of the Overall Winner award.

“This year we were looking for ground-breaking solutions that use IoT applications and technology to generate income, productivity and streamline efficiencies in the corporate world,” added Fortuin. “Interoperability, rapid deployment and ease-of-use were all major considerations.”

Steyn also noted that central to digital transformation is data and, more importantly, its availability.

“The inherent latency that accompanies the data transfer has been problematic, as has the consolidation of different data formats residing in various parts of any business. All this has to be considered before it can be transformed into structured, dynamic, definable and actionable insights.”

The awards were presented as part of MTN’s national IoT Conference, which highlighted the latest trends, challenges, and opportunities in the IoT space in a variety of industries, such as automotive, healthcare, asset and fleet management, manufacturing, security, retail, smart grid, smart metering, smart home, and consumer electronics.

The winner of the Most Disruptive Category went to Hear Scope, whilst Proximity ID took home the Wildcard category with their cardless instant identification and access control system.

The Most Innovative Hardware award went to Digital Matter, which supplies an innovative range of GPS tracking and telematics devices and a user-friendly web-based software platform to the fleet, logistics and communications industries. Indoor farming system MCX AgriTech came out tops in the Best Enterprise Development category.

Globalising its IoT solution

Earlier this year, IoT.nxt secured R100 million to pursue global expansion.

The Pretoria-based IoT company has secured a further R100m from its dedicated investor and funding partner Talent Holdings.

IoT.nxt has developed a world leading framework that makes the efficiencies, cost savings and increased revenue from IoT a reality for businesses.

The major strength of the IoT.nxt framework is that the solution is technology agnostic, which overcomes the challenge of connecting all devices or systems. This enables you to deploy best of breed technologies (hardware/sensors/subsystems) but at the same time also achieve interoperability and interconnectivity between all the currently deployed systems and devices from the edge to the cloud.

The IoT.nxt platform allows rapid deployment and businesses to action an Internet of Things strategy with little or no disruption to your current operations.

The MTN IoT awards are not the first for IoT.nxt.

Global consulting giant Gartner also selected the firm as one of six 2016 Aspiring Innovators in Africa. Also recognized as a finalist for the management of innovation in the category Emerging Enterprise at the DA Vinci Institute Technology Top 100 2016.The company also Achieved Microsoft Silver Partner status for data platform.