Finding the Right IoT Connectivity Provider Using Analyst Benchmarks and User Reviews
However, the mobile IoT technology landscape can be incredibly complex and is evolving at an ever-increasing pace. With new standards, technical solutions, and vendors continuously emerging, the possibilities are endless—but so are the challenges. Making the wrong choices can be costly in terms of time to market, customer experience, and ultimately the profitability of your solutions.
One key decision that is often overlooked, especially for new IoT solutions, is selecting the right managed IoT connectivity service provider. Despite providing services based on standardized technology, the choice of provider is crucial. This service provider ensures that all your devices are connected, meets the user experience expectations of your customers, and is your key source of support if something goes wrong. Typically, the IoT connectivity provider becomes one of the most long-term suppliers for your solution and can be costly and difficult to replace and this is especially true for large and geographically distributed deployments.
The Importance of Choosing the Right IoT Connectivity Provider
Selecting the right IoT connectivity service provider is critical for ensuring quality and TCO over time. Making this choice early in your design journey is beneficial, as the right provider can support you in crucial technology decisions and offer additional capabilities that simplify your solution, ensuring it works properly at scale, globally.
But with tens of potential providers, how do you find the right one for you? How do you avoid falling for whichever provider happens to be close or just promising a lot and instead establish a long-term partnership? And how do you make a shortlist when your own experience with operating a connected solution might be limited?
In this blog post, we’ll explore how to screen the market using industry analyst benchmarks and user reviews. These are tools that allow you to build on the experience of others, start with a holistic view, and helping you avoid costly mistakes. While you’ll still need to evaluate which supplier is right for your specific needs, benchmarks and reviews are invaluable tools for creating a shortlist and avoiding poor or unproven providers.
Key Analyst Companies for IoT Connectivity
Analysts firms include large companies covering the entire broader IT or telecom sectors such as Gartner, IDC and Omdia and smaller firms specializing in IT such as Berg Insight, Transforma Insight and IoT Analytics.
To help you navigate the complex IoT landscape, here is a list of reputable analyst firms that provide valuable insights, benchmarks, and reports on IoT connectivity:
- Gartner
- Focus:Comprehensive coverage of IT and telecommunications sectors, including Magic Quadrant reports for Managed IoT Connectivity Services.
- Useful Reports:Magic Quadrant for Managed IoT Connectivity Services, Worldwide.
- IDC (International Data Corporation)
- Focus:Global market intelligence, advisory services, and events for IT, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets.
- Useful Reports:MarketScape reports and in-depth IoT market analysis.
- Omdia
- Focus:Technology research with a strong emphasis on telecommunications and IoT.
- Useful Reports:IoT connectivity and platform insights.
- Berg Insight
- Focus:Independent market research focused on the IoT and M2M communications industries.
- Useful Reports:M2M/IoT research reports covering specific verticals and geographies.
- Transforma Insights
- Focus:Specialist research firm focused on IoT, AI, and Digital Transformation.
- Useful Reports:Communications Service Provider IoT Peer Benchmarking Report.
- IoT Analytics
- Focus:Market insights, research, and strategic guidance for IoT markets.
- Useful Reports:Market reports and company rankings for IoT connectivity.
Leveraging Industry Analyst Benchmarks
Industry analysts conduct market research within their respective sectors, mapping out market developments and reviewing vendors’ capabilities and successes. While typically not using such services themselves, by continuously interacting with users and vendors well connected analysts have accumulated a wealth of knowledge around what works in the long run. By subscribing to an analyst service, you can gain full access to their research through reports and often can consult directly with specialist analysts.
For making a shortlist of managed IoT connectivity providers, several analyst benchmarks are available, either fully or partly in the public domain. These can be used to create an initial shortlist. For example, Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Managed IoT Connectivity Services, Worldwide, and Transforma Insights’ Communications Service Provider IoT Peer Benchmarking Report are tools that can be used for this purpose.
For instance, Transforma Insights, a relatively young, but highly connected in the industry, firm, has identified 25 leading global IoT providers and ranked them based on their IoT connectivity and services capabilities. Such a benchmarks gives you an indication of which service providers could be right for you and who are worth talking too. They also highlight ongoing trends, such as the challenges smaller operators and independent providers face in keeping up with industry developments.
At Telenor IoT, we are proud to be recognized near the top of such benchmarks, with strong ratings reflecting our recent product launches like IoT Complete.
Utilizing User Reviews
We are all accustomed to using customer reviews in our personal lives for everything from hotels to the latest gadget. However, for enterprise IoT services, accessing user reviews has historically been more challenging.
This is where user communities for IT and telecom services come in. For example, Gartner Peer Insights is a vendor-free community where verified technology leaders can engage with peers and share knowledge. With over 60,000 leaders in the community and hundreds of thousands of technology reviews, this platform allows you to compare service experiences across dimensions like contracting, integration, support, and product capabilities.
In the Managed IoT Connectivity Services, Worldwide category, you can quickly see how actual users perceive their service providers and how they have managed issues over time. This way you can shortlist which providers could be relevant for your solution. Just like with consumer reviews it is important to consider vendors with enough reviews to be useful so in this case maybe 10 or 20 reviews at a minimum.
Managed Connectivity Services: IoT Connect
Ratings & Reviews
Conclusion and Next Steps
Choosing the right IoT connectivity provider is a critical step in ensuring the long-term success of your IoT solution. By leveraging industry analyst benchmarks and user reviews, you can make an informed decision, avoiding costly mistakes and setting your solution up for success.
If you’re looking for more insights or personalized advice on selecting the best IoT connectivity provider for your needs, feel free to reach out to us at Telenor IoT. We’re here to help guide you through this complex but rewarding journey.
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