IoT in the UK. Large growth & a billion pound market

The Internet of Things (IoT) may not be grabbing the immediate headlines in the telco trade press like O-RAN, 5G or even 6G, but nevertheless it’s a hugely developing and rapidly growing area of telecommunications with the United Kingdom. As reported by Statista, total revenue for the IoT UK market is projected to reach $1,086m by the end of 2022; and revenue is expected to show an annual compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.36%, resulting in a market volume of US$1,860m by 2027.

In March 2022, BT announced the trial of a new hyper-sensitive quantum antenna technology using excited atomic states that could boost the capability of next generation 5G and IoT networks. As reported on telecomtv.com “Atomic Radio Frequency (RF) receiver technology represents a revolutionary new way of detecting radio waves that could find much weaker signals than conventional receivers.” The significance of this technology means that these new type of receivers could enable IoT devices to be more cost efficient, last longer and support lower-cost smart cities and smart agriculture.

Howard Watson, Chief Technology Officer of BT said: “BT’s investment in cutting edge R&D plays a central role in ensuring the UK remains a network technology leader. Our programme has huge potential to boost the performance of our next generation EE network and deliver an even better service to our customers. Although it’s early days for the technology, we’re proud to be playing an instrumental role in developing cutting edge science”.

In addition to this, BT recently created Division X for enterprise businesses. This bespoke service hopes to bring state-of-the-art, cutting-edge services such as private 5G networks, edge computing, IoT and AI capabilities to its largest clients. Marc Overton, Managing Director of Division X at BT Enterprise, and formerly of Sierra Wireless and Cisco, stated that these unique services hope to move BT from “a telco to a tech co by expanding into adjacent services which go beyond traditional calls and lines.”

As a telecommunication and network technology specialist, we are already beginning to see an increase in recruitment activity for non-traditional telco roles e.g. IoT and Edge Computing. Pendy Hou from our London office said, “In addition to the typical telco roles we are recruiting for, there is noticeably a steady increase in the number of clients such as BT who are beginning to recruit for jobs in IoT and R&D. Whilst we’re not in the peak of the recruitment activity for these areas, we’re definitely seeing the start of I think will be a huge market in the coming years.”