How to Use 'Thingalytics' to Improve Business

By Dennis McCafferty

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Track Supply Chains

You can monitor items in a supply chain in real-time by using smart tags, which is more efficient than trying to find such items manually.
Reduce Breakdowns

With sensor data from office equipment, you can predict when certain parts are expected to fail and proactively order replacements to avoid delays.
Increase Revenue

Armed with customers' geographic locations, companies can send targeted, personalized marketing offers to the customers' mobile phones when they're near a store.
Test Concepts

You can try out a variety of concepts without knowing which will work. Sometimes a killer app comes from an unexpected source.
Align Business With IT

Tech teams need to know what's required to support business, and business teams must understand what tech is capable of doing. Both must collaborate to build strategic value.
Best Practices: Streamline Data Capture, Analysis

First figure out how to maximize the use of data you already have, and then develop the simplest way to acquire what you need.
Best Practices: Consider All Data Sources

The list of potentially actionable data is endless: Social data, news data, customer behavior data, location data, weather data, etc.
Best Practices: Incorporate Context Into the Plan

Without context, you'll never know that a customer appreciates offers on weekends but blocks them during the workweek—or that an employee never logs on at certain hours of the day.
Best Practices: Develop a Flexible Platform

The platform should come with general capabilities and allow the enterprise to prototype and evolve new apps quickly.
Best Practices: Measure Everything

It's all about recording, analyzing and using data. Use visualization technology to display data in a way that makes it easier to spot patterns.
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With the continued surge of interest in the Internet of things (IoT), the number of connected devices is expected to increase from 25 billion today to 50 billion by 2020, according to industry research. During the same time period, the number of connected devices per person will grow from 3.47 to 6.58. Given the wealth of data captured by IoT devices, organizations are focused on how to capture and analyze the information to make better business decisions, thereby creating a new tech buzz phrase: "thingalytics." In the recent book, Thingalytics: Smart Big Data Analytics for the Internet of Things (published by Software AG/available now), author John Bates provides a compelling, comprehensive guide to this emerging technology trend. With sensors establishing the activity and locations of devices—as well as the users and organizations that own them—companies can launch real-time analytics initiatives to boost productivity, decrease costs, maximize operational efficiencies and seize market opportunities from the very moment they emerge. The following examples of thingalytics' real-world capabilities and best practices have been adapted from the book. Bates is the former CTO at Progress Software and is the current CMO and head of industry solutions at Software AG.

This article was originally published on 2015-04-10

Dennis McCafferty is a freelance writer for Baseline Magazine.

How to Use 'Thingalytics' to Improve Business

Track Supply Chains

Reduce Breakdowns

Increase Revenue

Test Concepts

Align Business With IT

Best Practices: Streamline Data Capture, Analysis

Best Practices: Consider All Data Sources

Best Practices: Incorporate Context Into the Plan

Best Practices: Develop a Flexible Platform

Best Practices: Measure Everything