IoT (Internet of Things)

The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the ecosystem of physical devices, sensors, and systems connected to networks and able to collect, share, and act on data. This includes everything from smart home devices and wearables to industrial sensors and connected vehicles. IoT combines hardware, connectivity, data processing, and often artificial intelligence to create systems that respond to the physical world. For non-technical readers, IoT is about making physical things "smart" by connecting them to the internet. A traditional thermostat just controls temperature; an IoT thermostat learns your schedule, adjusts automatically, and can be controlled from your phone. The same principle applies at industrial scale: connected factories can predict equipment failures, optimise energy use, and respond to demand in real time. IoT projects typically involve multiple disciplines: hardware selection, connectivity (WiFi, cellular, LoRaWAN), data ingestion and storage, analytics, and application development. Cloud platforms from AWS, Azure, and Google provide managed services that simplify many of these concerns.