The Internet of Things could revitalize Pakistan’s IT Industry

With countless applications both in the industrial and commercial sphere, IOT devices are becoming a go-to option for most technophiles. From managing their small daily routine tasks such as smart coffee brew in the morning, remote air conditioning, remote pet food dispenser, remote power consumption regulator, baby crib monitor etc, IoT devices are taking over and are helping us save time, energy and money.

But that is not all, apart from accomplishing regular tasks, IoT devices are also increasing helping people manage critical tasks such as patient monitoring. Caretakers can now keep track of a dementia patient or can rely on emergency alerts for epilepsy or heart attack. And these are just a few things being accomplished through the use of IOT. Experts are now citing that the usage of smart devices will reach up to 50 billion worldwide by the year 2020. This is great news for the local and the international IT industry.

With the demand of IoT products increasing at an exponential rate, developing countries like Pakistan have an opportunity to capitalize on this trend. While our technology industry has seen a significant decline over the years, recent IoT-based research and development is slowing starting to gain traction and is promising to bring in investments from home and abroad.

Experts are now citing that the usage of smart devices will reach up to 50 billion worldwide by the year 2020.

A spokesperson from PlaxX, while attending the Telenor “Internet of Things Expo” in Lahore last year, explained:

“We have so much talent here, and we are seeing such a positive growth through these enablement programs. Small startups led by young enthusiastic individuals are popping up in hundreds and thousands, and while most of them are unknown today, some of them have then potential to become multi-million dollar companies if executed right.”

IoT Startups in Pakistan

While at the moment our country lacks the infrastructure to support manufacturing at home, small startups are accelerating their production through outsourcing, mainly to China. Pakistan has several emerging startups in the area of IoT. Here’s a look at the work they are doing.

1. Trequant

Trequant is a watch for tremor patients that helps in quantifying the severity of attacks by keeping a log of incidents on the patient’s smartphone and cloud storage for analysis.

2. Eye-Automate

Eye-Automate is another startup focusing on enabling disabled patients to perform actions such as turn on lights by moving their eyes (recital scanner).

3. Smart Devices

Smart Devices is focusing on home automation through use of its smart hub and switch boards that can allow the user to control any appliance at home remotely.

4. BlueEast

This is a newly found technology company focusing on home appliance monitoring and control. While the company is currently working with other manufacturers to develop products it is also simultaneously pursuing to launch consumer products in 2017.

5. Electroid

Electroid, a startup incubed at NetSol Technologies, that through use of its application and smart devices helps the user track their electric consumption.

6. Fictive Lab’s Wattie

Fictive Lab has a similar product in production called Wattie that delivers the electricity usage data directly to your mobile device along with analytics and suggestions on how to manage your consumption.

Also it is important to mention Telenor and their current crop of products that include a companion watch for tracking using GSM and Automate, their version of companion watch for your car albeit with additional functionality that includes driving reports including speed patterns.

With these and more small home-based startups, there is still a chance for Pakistan to revive its IT industry. Incubation programs such as Plan X, Plan 9, Velocity, Nest I/O, NSPIRE are enabling a crop of young and enthusiastic minds to take the center stage. Despite the fact that it would be long before we see these seeds come to fruition, it is good to know that a movement is already underway.

Image Source – BayForce