Category: Strategy

smart buildings in the age of covid-19

How COVID-19 clarified the necessity and value of smart buildings

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in COVID-19, Digital Transformation, Economic Impact, Internet of Things, IoT, Safe Spaces, Smart Buildings, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

Smart buildings transform the spaces in which we work, live, shop, and relax. They implement innovations that change what we do, how we do it, and where we do it. The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted how we used indoor spaces, and despite our progress in combatting the disease, scientists believe it will persist. What then becomes the role of smart buildings?
This blog updates the definition of today’s smart buildings and describes its evolved roles.

Safe Space office picture

Creating COVID-19 Safe Spaces for Reopening and Return to Work (Part Two)

Posted on Benson Chan4 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, COVID-19, IoT, New Normal, Safe Spaces, Smart Buildings, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy, Urban Planning

COVID-19 Safe Spaces are key to reopening buildings and facilities for in-person activities. Technology is a critical component of the COVID-19 safe space. There is no one technology that makes a space safe. A variety of technologies, working in tandem, is used in safe spaces.

This blog, Part 2 in a series, discusses the role of technology and IoT in the operation of a safe space. Key considerations, from the use case, operations and maintenance, and technology are presented.

Creating COVID-19 Safe Spaces for Reopening and Return to Work (Part One)

Posted on Benson Chan5 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, COVID-19, New Normal, Safe Spaces, Smart Buildings, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy, Urban Planning

The discovery and regulatory approval of two COVID-19 vaccines in late 2020 has made reopening and return to work initiatives top priority for business and community leaders in 2021. Despite the vaccine, COVID-19 isn’t going away and many people are concerned about a return to in-person activities.

This blog introduces the concept of safe spaces to support reopening and return to work. A framework describing the elements of a safe space is discussed, along with ten best practices for planning safe spaces.

covid-19 safe spaces facilitate reopening and return to work

Responding to COVID-19 – a framework for smart cities

Posted on Benson Chan2 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, COVID-19, Innovation Management, Product Management, product-market fit, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted cities and communities worldwide. As the number of infections and deaths surge, governments are turning to technology and innovative approaches for help. However, current efforts to engage the innovation communities are reactive, piecemeal, and have limited effectiveness.

This blog describes a Smart Cities COVID-19 Collaboration framework. It provides a structured way to identify the collaboration opportunities between cities, public health systems and the technology community.

smart buildings in a smart city

Smart Buildings – What’s In It for Cities? (Part Two)

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Digital Transformation, Industrial IoT, Internet of Things, Smart Buildings, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

Smart buildings bring new and significant value to tenants, building owners and operators. These benefits range from increased tenant productivity and safety, lower operating costs, and higher satisfaction. But what value do smart buildings bring to cities?

This article, the second of two parts, describes a framework used to identify areas of value creation by smart buildings for the benefit of cities. A sample set of benefits, and a format for presenting these in a consumable format well suited for city leaders, is presented.

smart buildings - credit to Beau Swierstra

Smart Buildings – What’s In It for Cities? (Part One)

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Digital Transformation, Industrial IoT, Internet of Things, Smart Buildings, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

Smart buildings bring new and significant value to tenants, building owners and operators. These benefits range from increased tenant productivity and safety, lower operating costs, and higher satisfaction. But what value do smart buildings bring to cities?

In order to understand how cities (and smart cities) benefit from smart buildings, Part One (of two) of this article provides a background understanding of the things that cities care about (outcomes), and how these outcomes are viewed the four civic priorities and perspectives.

Building the Smart Region: an opportunity for electric utility companies

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Business Models, Digital Transformation, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

While smart cities represent a major business opportunity for utility companies, they are better suited to co-lead the building of the “smart region”. Utility companies have the regional focus, infrastructure, resources, operational and execution capabilities to support the largest metropolitan areas to the smaller cities and regions.

This article discusses some entry level smart region opportunities for utility companies, as well as some of the key gaps they must address.

smart city trust

Smart City Trust – think beyond cybersecurity and privacy

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Industrial IoT, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

While a smart city is powered by technology and data, it is enabled and sustained by trust. Many people equate trust with privacy and cybersecurity. However, these are only two elements of many that create trust in a smart city. Trust must be embedded into the processes, policies and technology that create the city services. It must be integrated into its creators, users and beneficiaries from the very beginning.

This article introduces a holistic framework for building trust in a smart city for smart city planners and architects to consider.

Smart City Ecosystem Framework

Planning Sustainable Smart Cities with the Smart City Ecosystem Framework

Posted on Benson Chan6 CommentsPosted in Digital Transformation, Internet of Things, Smart City, Smart Communities, Strategy

The smart city is a complex ecosystem of people, processes, policies, technology and other enablers working together to deliver a set of outcomes.

Despite this, many planners today are not taking an ecosystem approach to smart city projects. This article introduces the smart city ecosystem framework, a more holistic and multi-dimensional approach, to building more sustainable, scalable and relevant smart cities.

IoT build, buy, partner

Build, buy, partner? Strategic options for creating smart solutions

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Execution, Industrial IoT, Internet of Things, Product Management, Strategy

IoT enables vendors to create an entirely new line of “smart” solutions for its existing and new markets. While the decision to go “smart” is straightforward, the decision of how to go “smart” is less obvious. Vendors are faced with a “build, buy, partner” decision – build it themselves, buy and integrate technology, or partner with another organization and go to market together.

This article discusses some of the key management considerations involved in making a decision.

5 IoT Lessons Learned from dot-com mistakes

Five “dot com” mistakes that IoT companies must avoid

Posted on Benson Chan2 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, Execution, Internet of Things, Strategy

We are in a modern day gold rush, sparked by the Internet of Things (IoT). Thousands of companies, new and established, are planning “smart” solutions.

Amid all this, what IoT lessons learned from the past can today’s IoT companies apply to avoid mistakes of previous “gold rushes”? Are we smarter now, or are we making the same mistakes? The answer is yes and yes. This articles identifies five major mistakes made by dot-companies and five Iearnings for today’s IoT companies.

IoT innovation is not in the solution, but in how it is used

IoT innovation is not in the technology, but in what it can do

Posted on Benson Chan4 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, Digital Transformation, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Strategy

Don’t confuse IoT with innovation. The real IoT innovation is not in the technology, but in what it can do and what it allows organizations to become – intelligent, agile and adaptive, in creating new value for its customers.

This article describes five innovation paths with IoT solutions to consider when planning digital transformation projects, along with advice to get started on turning the Internet of Things into the Innovation of Things.

management considerations for IoT subscription models

Six Management Considerations for Planning IoT Subscription Models

Posted on Benson Chan2 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, Business Models, go-to-market, Internet of Things, sales, Strategy

One common monetization approach for today’s IoT solutions is the subscription model. While it provides an attractive recurring revenue stream, subscription models require major investments in resources, time, capital and management commitment.

In this blog, we’ll highlight six key strategic and critical considerations managers must address when planning and building IoT subscription models. These considerations will determine whether the IoT subscription service is successful or not.

8 things to stop doing if you want to sell more IoT

Selling IoT? Eight Things To Stop Doing If You Want To Sell More

Posted on Benson Chan4 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, go-to-market, Internet of Things, IoT, Product Management, sales, Strategy

Despite the disruptive and transformative potential of IoT, selling IoT solutions is today’s emerging marketplace is challenging. Buyers face many barriers, ranging from a lack of awareness to fears of early obsolescence.

In this blog, we’ll share the eight things IoT solutions vendors must stop doing right away. Instead, we’ll share eight alternative best practices and strategies that they should be doing instead to drive market adoption.

Future-proofing your IoT Infrastructure

Posted on Benson Chan1 CommentPosted in Best Practices, Innovation Management, IoT, Product Management, Strategy

Buyers face a dilemma with buying IoT solutions today. Buy an immature solution now and risk obsolescence in the near future, even if the solution has value for them today, or hold off buying until things become clearer.

In this blog, we will share common causes of obsolescence and a framework for futureproofing your IoT infrastructure. We will list some tactical practices to put in place to maximize the useful life of your IoT solution.

Ten best practices for making your first IoT projects a success

Posted on Benson Chan1 CommentPosted in Best Practices, Digital Transformation, Execution, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, project management, Strategy

A recent study by Cisco found that three quarters of IoT projects were not successful. The reasons included long completion times, poor data quality, lack of internal expertise, integration and budget overruns.

In this blog, we will share ten best practices, from project planning to implementation, to help managers and project planners overcome common mistakes made with projects implementing emerging technology solutions.

The secrets to successful partnerships in the fast changing IoT market – Part 2

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Best Practices, Execution, go-to-market, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Partnerships, Product Management, sales, Strategy

Today’s IoT market is very dynamic, continuously evolving, and fragmented. No single vendor has a connected IoT stack. Partnerships are a critical business capability that IoT vendors must develop in order to be relevant in this type of marketplace.

This post, the second of two parts, describes ten best practices that vendors should use when forming and managing partnerships with other IoT partners.

The secrets to successful partnerships in the fast changing IoT market – Part 1

Posted on Benson ChanLeave a commentPosted in Best Practices, Execution, FAQs, go-to-market, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Partnerships, Product Management, sales, Strategy

Today’s IoT market is very dynamic, continuously evolving, and fragmented. No single vendor has a connected IoT stack. Partnerships are a critical business capability that IoT vendors must develop in order to be relevant in this type of marketplace. This post, the first of two parts, describes the basic partnership types, the relationship models and key engagement scope parameters.

execution options for IoT projects

Planning IoT Pilot Projects: Execution Options

Posted on Renil Paramel7 CommentsPosted in Execution, Innovation Management, Internet of Things, Product Management, Strategy

You’re sold on the Internet of Things (IoT) and its benefits for your organization. But how do you get in the IoT “game”? Where do you start?

While there is a lot of information on the technology behind IoT, case studies, and visions of what it can do, there is not a lot of practical content on what you need to get started today.

This post discusses five options that managers have for executing pilot IoT projects.

IoT as a service

Selling IoT as a Service – 7 Best Practices

Posted on Benson Chan2 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, Business Models, Execution, go-to-market, Internet of Things, sales, Strategy

IoT or Internet of Things solutions, built on a cloud-based infrastructure, create opportunities for new business models and value delivery methods. While many IoT solutions are usually sold as a “product”, many vendors are now beginning to offer IoT “as-a-service”.

Selling a recurring revenue solution is not the same as selling an “one time” sale product. This post presents seven best practices for selling IoT as a service.

iot buyers

Selling IoT – Who Is Your Real Buyer?

Posted on Benson Chan5 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, FAQs, go-to-market, Internet of Things, sales, Strategy

You found product-market fit and built your Internet of Things (IoT) solution. But do you know who your buyer is?

IoT solutions create value that cut across organizational boundaries. Identifying a single buyer or owner in today’s traditionally structured organizations is difficult. Unlike IT where there is a centralized buyer, IoT buying is decentralized.

This post describes the reasons for this, and provides six best practices for selling IoT solutions into corporate organizations.

Buying IoT from startups

Buy smart: best practices for sourcing IoT solutions from start-ups

Posted on Benson Chan3 CommentsPosted in Best Practices, Internet of Things, Strategy

A lot of the innovation around Internet of Things (IoT) is coming from start-up companies. But how do you buy a solution when the technology is still evolving, the use cases are emerging, and the company selling it may not be in business a year from now? Your “tried and true” sourcing practices that you use with your more established suppliers will actually increase the risks for both you and the start-up company that you are buying from.

This post describes the three main risks and highlights ten new strategies for buying IoT solutions for start-up companies.

Five things managers should do first in an emerging IoT market

Posted on Benson Chan3 CommentsPosted in Digital Transformation, Internet of Things, IoT, Strategy

There is no lack of IoT platforms, business models, and innovative products in the market today. However, today’s products are still immature point solutions. From technology standards, to business models, IoT will evolve over the next few years.

Given the immature state of IoT, what should transformation, business and IT managers do today?

This article discusses five things that managers should do now as they plan and deploy IoT strategies and projects.

5 types of innovation

Innovation is not just about technology – the five types of innovation all managers must know

Posted on Benson Chan3 CommentsPosted in FAQs, Innovation Management, Strategy

Recently, I met with key executives from an industry trade group to discuss disruptive innovation in Silicon Valley.

One key concept I shared with them is that although many people equate innovation with technology, there are actually five types of innovation and that some or all may occur at the same time.

This post describes the five types of innovation, and provides managers with three takeaways to guide their innovation strategy.