6. Stronger Focus On Interoperability

One major issue that Internet of Things devices are facing is interoperability. The IoT market came together as many manufacturers made their devices based on some protocols, such as Wi-Fi, Thread, and Bluetooth, but not others. In the coming year, manufacturers will make a bigger effort to standardize their IoT solutions hardware, software around key protocols.

"Protocols and standards are key to the success of IoT systems, as well as regulations to enable ultimate data and privacy protection and security," said IoT expert Dr. Shipeng Li, CTO of Chinese IoT platform company IngDan. "We’ll see companies, associations, governments [and] consumers come together to tackle several areas of interoperability, such as data."