The power of technology is offering new drives to our lives every day with smarter additions. IoT and cloud computing are two of the individual arena which has benefitted us in many ways. Most of us are well aware of the IoT (Internet of Things) associated terms like smart city, smart home, etc., by now. If you are new to the term IoT, please refer to my previous blog section on IoT to find more information.
Suppose IoT is the key to integrate smart home solutions to business tools and paved the way for the advanced solution in healthcare, transportation, logistics, energy, and many other fields. In that case, Cloud is no way far from it. The benefits of cloud computing in IoT is pervasive in many ways.
In other words, IoT and cloud computing complement each other. Both are working towards increasing the efficiency of everyday tasks. While IoT has penetrated mainstream technology and market place, it generates a massive amount of big data. Besides, cloud computing paves the way for this enormous data. From a storage solution to accessing data remotely, IoT and cloud computing builds an integration. Not only storage and access, but there are also many areas where we can do a fit-gap analysis between IoT and cloud computing.
Is cloud an essential need for IoT?
Cloud computing has made a massive shift in storage solutions for business as well as for individual use. Furthermore, the scalability and the data dynamics of cloud solutions make data available remotely. Hence, it has proved itself an efficient solution for data transfer through internet channels and via dedicated direct link depending on the business needs.
The cloud is a great enabler of IoT that solved the data-driven needs of the business. The cloud as technology provides an agile platform to develop meaningful IoT applications for better data devices over the internet.
Speed and scale – two of the main criteria of cloud computing are the unmatched combinations with IoT’s networking and mobility. So, the combined power of IoT and cloud computing make the most out of their combination. Some aspects undoubtedly prove that the cloud is essential for the success of IoT. Here are some of the pointers:
Cloud acts as a remote processing power.
Dependencies on on-premises infrastructure are becoming an obsolete choice. With the pervasive use of IoT devices, a massive amount of big data generation needs a huge storage process and high processing speed. In this context, the cloud brings the advantage of vast storage space. With the 4G and 5G internet speed, the cloud also helps the developers offload the fast computing process.
Cloud enhances the security and privacy of IoT data.
IoT means massive data generation. And when we need to deal with data, an obvious question of data security and privacy comes into the picture. Additionally, IoT harnesses mobility. Hence, with cloud intervention, we can expect more preventive, corrective, and detective measures. With effective authentication and encryption protocols, the cloud enables users with strong security measures.
No need for on-premises hosting
Plug and play hosting services are the need of the hour for IoT devices. Usually, for plug and play hosting services, we need large equipment or hardware. This is a highly expensive affair for organizations or individuals. With the combined power of IoT and cloud computing, you don’t need to depend on massive equipment. It is a ready-to-roll model offered by cloud computing, which removes any entry barriers for the IoT hosting providers.
Better inter-device communication
The cloud plays the role of communication facilitators with its powerful APIs for the IoT. These APIs help in easy linking to smart devices. This also facilitates inter-device communication.
Reduced cost of ownership
Cloud technology prevents businesses from setting up the infrastructure, and at the same time, it offers ample resources. Hence, it saves a lot of amount for setting up infrastructure. Furthermore, as there is no concept of on-site systems, hardware, and software in the cloud, the IT departments become more focused on their day-to-day activities.
Business continuity programs
Cloud computing ensures business continuity, even if sudden disasters happen during the process. As data is maintained on additional separate servers, there is no chance of data loss, which is far more essential for the case of IoT based infrastructure.
Low Entry Barrier
Innovations in the IoT domain need hassle-free hosting solutions. Hence, cloud computing in IoT is an appropriate solution. With cloud computing in place, IoT players can harness remote data centers’ power without the need for on-premises hardware and software. From the cost perspective, cloud computing in IoT is an ideal solution as the users only need to follow the pay-as-you-go model. This saves enormous upfront costs.
As a result, companies can seamlessly implement large-scale IoT initiatives. This reduces the entry barrier for most IoT-based businesses.
Inter-device Communication
Cloud computing in IoT facilitates seamless communication between IoT devices. This enables many robust APIs to interact between connected devices and smart devices. This way, cloud computing paves the way for the growth of connected technologies.
How do Cloud platforms enable IoT applications?
Cloud computing and IoT enables portability and interoperability in developing IoT application across the network of different cloud setups. Not to mention, these are the intercloud benefits that businesses can take advantage of. Such intercloud solutions possess SDKs, which enterprises can use to create their application without worrying about the backend processes. Besides, the cloud enables application hosting, deployment, and update of IoT applications.
Furthermore, Fog computing is considered to be an appropriate platform for the Internet of Things (IoT) use cases such as Connected Vehicle, Smart Grid, Smart Cities, Wireless Sensors and Actuators Networks (WSANs). Here, you can innovate network structure efficiently and faster. Using Fog computing, one can directly leverage the “things,” and here no need to introduce new boxes in the network. However, the backend activities are performed using SDK, which allows URL wrapping, location tracking, content tagging, and behavior monitoring.
Please refer to this blog to know more detail – How Fog Computing and Cloudlets bring IoT to the cloud.
Additionally, cloud computing makes IoT systems fault-tolerant. Device shadowing or digital twins is another benefit that cloud computing facilitates to IoT systems. In this process, developers can create the backup of devices and running applications in the cloud, making it fault-tolerant. Furthermore, they can take statistics offline. Simultaneously, organizations can also set up virtual servers, create applications, and launch a database to help run their IoT solution.
What are the challenges associated with IoT and cloud computing?
No doubt, cloud computing accelerates the growth of IoT. And IoT and cloud computing integration is the next giant leap after the internet. However, the implementation of IoT and cloud computing is challenging, and those challenges come from generated data to networking levels. IoT cloud solution burdens users with many challenges. Here are some of them:
Handling a large amount of data
With millions of devices in the picture, IoT generates an overwhelming amount of data. On the contrary, there is no exact or proven method for the cloud to manage big data. This can put the overall performance of applications at stake.
Related post – Big data and IoT a Perfect Match
Networking and communication protocols
IoT and cloud computing involves different types of device communication. Such machine-to-machine communications use various protocols. The majority of applications do not involve mobility. Furthermore, Bluetooth and Wi-fi are mainly used as a stop-gap solution. Thus managing this kind of variation is a real challenge.
Sensor networks
Sensors are a major source of IoT data. The sensor network helps users to measure, understand, and infer delicate indicators from the environment. However, processing such a massive amount of sensor data on time is a more significant challenge. Though the cloud helps aggregate this data, due to privacy and security issues, it hinders such data’s progression.
Leading Cloud Services for IoT Deployments
Many enterprises maintain their own on-premises cloud platform for security and faster data access. However, that might not be a cost-effective solution either way. So, on-demand cloud service, which typically follows the pay-as-you-go model, is the ideal solution for companies engaged in IoT solutions.
At present, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure are the leading cloud service providers that leverage IoT implementations. Here is the list of IoT services offered by AWS and Azure.
AWS IoT Services
Microsoft Azure IoT Services:
Final words:
The integration of IoT and cloud computing is indicative of the next big thing after the internet. We can witness the new applications happening from the combination of IoT and cloud computing services. These applications are opening new arenas of businesses and research. Thus, we can expect that with IoT cloud combination can bring a paradigm shift in multi-networking and open services platforms.