Episode 141: Alexa suits up for business

Last week Amazon made a slew of IoT announcements at its annual user conference, bringing established functions into general availability and surprising us with the launch of Amazon’s Free RTOS after it hired the man responsible for the most popular embedded OS for microcontrollers. It also introduced Alexa for business. Kevin and I share our thoughts on that and also discussed Microsoft’s own platform announcement, the Google/Amazon spat, and Walmart’s search for a cheap sensor. I share my learnings from an event on IoT business models held at Target’s Open house last week and Kevin shares his thoughts on the GoControl/Linear garage door controller. We also discuss naming conventions thanks to a question on the IoT Podcast hotline. Amazons IoT dreams are becoming clear. The guest this week put the challenges of building an IoT project into perspective. After years of being “spoiled by cloud computing,” Upal Basu of NGP Capital says that we have to reframe our IoT projects with longer ROIs and more of a focus on decentralized deployments away from the corporate offices. His ideas make sense for anyone familiar with complexities of deploying sensors, and it’s a good interview for folks thinking about how to transform her business using connectivity, sensors and cloud analytics. I hope you enjoy the show. Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham Guest: Upal Basu, General Partner at NGP Capital Sponsors: Lux Products and ADT Greengrass, Free RTOS, Device Defender and more from Amazon Alexa gets her MBA Sustainable IoT hardware is actually a service You returns on IoT investments should be years, not 12-18 months The value in IoT deployments happens where the sensors are The post Episode 141: Alexa suits up for business appeared first on IoT Podcast - Internet of Things.