Enterprise IoT is for business. IIoT for industry. That’s it. We could finish this post in three sentences, but…
There is a little more to IT. Within the domain of IoT many of the requests for an IoT product comes from a business team leader to a software person, usually a senior software developer. In the industry focused scenario that conversation is different. The process or the product drives the change (normally).
Dysfunctionality
Internal teams trying to make a process run more smoothly is more achievable within the office environment because many of the skills exist within their domain already. The conversation is fluid, the terms are familiar, …sometimes too familiar. The default political position in “the office” is whatever “management says.” Real world machine 2 machine (M2M) dysfunctionality is far more direct and obvious.
Critical failure
There are differences in scope, operating environments, real-time demands, regulations, systems integration, etc. A key difference in critical failure. There is a very low tolerance in industry for absolute failure. Many IIoT applications are safety-critical and have severe revenue consequences. Immediate production loss is a deal -breaker.
We can say the objective differences are that one evolves from enterprise IT infrastructure and business networks. The other comes from industrial automation, SCADA, PLCs, DCS systems in factory settings. There is also a difference in what is being connected, whether it is “hardware” or “software.” based things. Although that distinction is a little abstract initially, we can clear it up in the next paragraph.
Machine lifecycle
An older industrial machine that has been in operation for decades is a far different animal to a desktop connected tool like a printer or even a modern fleet vehicle. The amount of computational resources at hand allows those “things” to interact relatively easily with the internet. An industrial machine will usually require assistance, sometimes even a little bit of finesse, in getting it to report the correct data. The same applies to rough and difficult environmental conditions. An office is pretty safe for electronics.
That “field” connectivity skillset that the industrial IoT vendor brings to the table is based on a different set of tools; knowledge of different types of R/T and wireless communications, electrical connectivity outdoors, industrial fixings, working at heights, on nights, and in tight spaces. The industrial space is “undomesticated.” It carries a type of non uniform design, as it evolves from small shop floor to bigger warehouses that later evolve into giant international conglomerates.
