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An approach to the impact of transformation

from the traditional use of ICT to the Internet
of Things: How smart solutions can...
Conference Paper October 2016

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Blerton Abazi
University for Business and Technology
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An approach to the impact of transformation from the traditional use of ICT to

the Internet of Things: How smart solutions can transform SMEs
Blerton Abazi*
*Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering
*University for Business and Technology,
Lagjja Kalabria p.n Prishtina, Kosovo
(Tel: 038 541 400; e-mail: blerton.abazi@ubt-uni.net).
Abstract: People, processes, data and things are brought together to make networked connections more
relevant and valuable by transforming the informations to the concrete actions which creates new
experiences and wide opportunities for people and businesses. It is well known that we use technology
for the effectiveness but there are applications of the technology that will make the difference between
Internet of Things and other standard technologies.
Through this paper I would like to explain the process and benefits of business transformation, the impact
of the switching from the traditional use of ICT and new digital era which is known as Internet of Things
and the value of the internet of things economy.
Keywords: internet of things, technology, processes, data, things, server, architecture, digital, business,
growth, transformation
1. INTRODUCTION
Based on the researches and statistics, the Internet of Things
could be considered as a wide opportunity for SMEs who
intend to orient their services to the use of ICT.
The development of Internet of Things brought a new era of
information use through which businesses collect data and
use them to analyse, measure and conclude for a specific
issue which effect on their business. Some other business
uses those data for their marketing strategies as well. The
IOT may play a vital role on the relation between an SME
and the customer.
According to Cisco until 2020 there will be approximately 50
billion objects connected to the Internet.
Looking into details of the impact of the Internet of Things to
SMEs we can say that by using the automate customer
checkouts, tracking the inventory and automatically
monitoring tools there may be a satisfaction to the customer.
Generally, as much as the SME is connected to the Internet of
Things, there is an opportunity to get data and make more
customers.

2. THE IMPORTANCE OF THE IOT TO THE

ECONOMY AND THE IMPACT TO SMEs
The only thing that makes companies, being competitive on
the market is the change for technology. Nowadays, there are
many trends on the world and business who make transitions
by gathering together the people and technology, processes,
data and things.
Companies that understood quickly the benefits from the
Internet of Things were rewarded with very large scale of
increased revenues. 1And most of the revenues, came from
the lost from the companies that were waiting or couldnt
adapt quickly and effectively to the new trend.
Most of the people are convinced that new technologies
provided a lot of benefits, there are still some others that
express concerns.
There are several companies that already sell and buy online,
or provide other services which in one way of other there are
part of the internet of thins. But, it is very important for the
today economy that the Internet of Things could transform
the way how we live, how we travel and as well how we use
the services.
Some of the key values of the technology developed
platforms is the combination of the demand and supply to the
existing industries. By this combination and the technology
used, companies made us for customers to access their
services by using smartphone, sensors etc.

Figure 1 Predicted Growth of the number of devices

connected to the Internet

We are aware that mobile devices and smart platforms have

changes the people the way how they interact, shop and
access to the information. There is a must to businesses to be
adapted and leverage the data and virtual assets by
maximizing the interaction between device and the user.

must pay attention to the people in order to achieve more on

information security.
4. CHALLENGES IN SECURITY
It is not possible to describe the positive aspect of the Internet
of Things to SMEs without mentioning the security issues. In
general, the security issues to Information and
communication Technologies still remains very important
point and with high sensitivity. Internet of Things security is
not limited strictly to any point of security, this may include:
privacy, standards, legality, data manipulation etc.
Securing a system with Internet of Thing platform is
considered challenge because it includes several point of
vulnerability.

Figure 2 Internet of Things Ecosystem

A survey made by Capgemini shows that 60% of respondents

face challenges on securing end-point devices, 55% on
securing the communication channels while 50% face with
challenges on deploying security updates on end-point
devices.

As the main components for IoT are considered the sensors

which are embedded into devices, the use of internet some
storage and processing servers and as well the Cloud. The
technology used by sensors is an essential tool for smartly
capturing big data.
8

Internet of Thing will affect different sectors while around

25% are already using the Internet of Things technologies.
Until 2020 the technology is going to have a huge effect on
customers and businesses worldwide. Considering Internet of
Things as new technology, there will be a slow progression
and impact on businesses even that their aim is to increase the
customer satisfaction and their revenues.
Related to the manufactures companies,
3. IOT STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT FOR SMEs
As we have mentioned previously in our paper, we do believe
that IOT will change the way of doing business and will
interconnect business and processes. Especially, there will be
a significant change to the manufacturing enterprises by
implementing the IOT technology.
Raising up the capacities for the employers on the knowledge
for Internet of Things is one of the main important points for
a company. 2We see that many company owners and
managers still do not know what is Internet of Things and
how it can have a positive impact to the company. In order to
develop new strategy for company there is a need of
changing technologies and corresponding knowledge for
implementation. Companies must distribute the knowledge
faster if they want to be on the top of market before the
competitors acquire the same knowledge. This is the reason
why company owners and managers should have the
knowledge and skills how to transfer it quickly.
People are considered as the main drivers in change with the
development of IoT. Related to this we think that companies

Figure 3 Challenges on securing IoT Products

Based on this we consider that many companies and
organizations have lack of IT experiences staff for
transforming. This can be explained by the analyse that many
organizations do not consider security as primary issue until
they develop IoT Products. 10Only 48% of organizations
consider the security to their products just from the beginning
of their development.
Our good will to interconnect every device to the internet by
exploring new opportunities may reflect to the grow of
potential risks on the security issues. Every IoT device which
is not highly protected in aspect of security may be used as a
first entry for overall system to create cyberattack or causing
and malfunction to the devices and the system in general.
Failing of specific devices to complete their tasks, may cause
a problem also to other services which are interconnected and
in general the system could not offer the highly performance.
The security challenges begin to appear on the systems
immediately when the smart devices started to become
important to the Internet of Things Technologies and

computers are no longer traditional endpoints of the Internet

Connectivity. Manufacturers of the IoT devices are facing
with the challenge of designing devices and increasing
security to those devices for a long term functionality and
with greater performance compare with traditional
computers.
4.1 PRIVACY BACKGROUND
It is crucial that any company or manufacture to ensure that
privacy rights be respected and to ensure the trust in the
internet. Those rights many times are placed in the ethical
data handling which emphasizes the respect to all the users
and the fair use of their data.
We are aware that often Internet of Things refers to a large
network of devices which are built to gather data on the
respective environment, which frequently included data
related to people.
These data are considered to provide an opportunity for the
owner of the equipment, but usually this benefit shall also
provide the equipment manufacturers as well. Collection and
use of data from IOT has become a sensitive privacy issue, at
the time when the individuals that are observed by IoT
devices have different expectations about privacy.
On the other hand, it is likely that users are not aware that an
IoT device can collect data from it and potentially scatter to
other parties. 7This type of data collection has become more
visible in smart devices such as new smart TV and video
game equipment. These type of products have a voice
recognition device and can hear ongoing conversations or see
any activity in the room and in some cases transmit data to a
cloud service for further processing.
5. CONCLUSIONS
Based on our research and the informations we analysed the
transition to the Internet of Things we can conclude that there
is a need for a cost effective and business value driven SMEs
which are technologically oriented services and agile.
In order to do that, there are several steps that should be
performed such as: reduction of business costs, reinvesting of
savings to the technology oriented services, IT and Business
architecture linked strongly between each other, representing
the IT in terms of services such as app, host etc.
Even that there are many advantages of the use of IOT for
SMEs, there are still some doubts and challenges related to
the privacy and security. There is a risk that the data
generated from all the machines and devices connected, may
end up in the wrong hands.

In the other hand we can see that weak point of the IOT
technology in relation with SMEs are lack of innovative
products from companies, very low quality of services and
product delivery services.
4

We see great opportunities by integration the Internet of

Things technology to SMEs because of bringing new era of
doing business and there may be a need from the political
point of view by creating special policies for companies that
implement Internet of Things.
Internet of Things are deeply changing the way of doing
business and how the companies interact with their
customers. As one of the most important advantages of the
Internet of Things is that companies by collecting data from
the connected devices, they can create a solid advantage on
competition in comparison with other companies that do not
use advanced technologies.
6

There will be a great threat to the companies from the big

enterprises who can be considered as strong competitors,
while there is a threat of predicting the economic growth.
Also another threat that we have mentioned as opportunity is
the law of the counties are not enough right.
6. FUTURE QUESTIONS TO BE CONSIDERED
The development of Internet of Thing technology as a global
and unique entity is a challenge. Different countries may
have specific issues and requirements, and this is one of the
reasons that IoT should be considered applicable to
developing markets as well.
9

On our research we have found two main issues that may be

addressed as questions in the future related to the
transformation of SMEs to the Internet of Things
technologies as following:
Infrastructure: Even that Internet connection has been grown
rapidly, there are still some gaps remain on the high-speed
and easy access in some countries, included business and
commercial packs. So the future question to be addressed
may be on What could be considered Internet of Thing on the
countries that face with lack of IT Infrastructure? or What
will be the platform that support such a transformation?
The other important case that may be addressed is the part of
the Policies and regulation, that may support SMEs who tend
to transform their business to Internet of Things technology.
Our question may be, Are the governments and policymakers
ready to support SMEs during the transformation, by helping
them financially or providing them facilities on their
business.

By streaming on the SWOT analysis the SMEs integration to

IOT strategy we can see that there are many strengths such as
the adoption of the SMEs on using the e-commerce
technologies, the adoption of the IOT from many logistic
companies, reaching the customers in large distances and as
well offering online support to products 24/7 via internet.

REFERENCES
1

The Internet of Things : An Overview, Internet Society,

October 2015

From the Internet of Computers to the Internet of Things

Friedemann Mattern and Christian Floerkemeier
Internet of Things (IoT): A Vision, Architectural Elements,
and Future Directions, Jayavardhana Gubbi, Rajkumar
Buyya, Slaven Marusic, Marimuthu Palaniswami
Internet of Things From Research and Innovation to Market
Deployment, Rivers Publication
Internet of Things has huge potential for SMEs
http://www.knowledgetransferireland.com/News/%E2%80%
98Internet-of-Things%E2%80%99-has-huge-potential-forSMEs.html
3

Are SMEs ready to tame the Internet of Things?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sponsored/business/smehome/news/10830886/internet-of-things.html
5

Internet of Things, Converging Technologies for Smart

Environments and Integrated Ecosystem, River Publisher
6

Internet of Things for Smart Cities, Andrea Zanella, Senior

Member, IEEE, Nicola Bui, Angelo Castellani, Lorenzo
Vangelista, Senior Member, IEEE, Michele Zorzi, Fellow,
IEEE
7

Mobile Cybersecurity and the Internet of Things

Empowering M2M Communication, CTIA
8

Systems Computing Challenges in the Internet of Things

Rajeev Alur, Emery Berger, Ann W. Drobnis, Limor Fix,
Kevin Fu, Gregory D. Hager, Daniel Lopresti, Klara
Nahrstedt, Elizabeth Mynatt, Shwetak Patel, Jennifer
Rexford, John A. Stankovic, and Benjamin Zorn
9

Research Directions for the Internet of Things, John A.

Stankivic
10

Developing Internet of Things & Industrial Internet

Opportunies Research made by Sogeti LABS and
Capgemini