China's IoT services revenues to be $41B by 2020

China’s Internet of Things (IoT) services revenues will grow more than five times in the next five years, exceeding US$41 billion by 2020. This is the fastest revenue growth rate of any country monitored in ABI Research’s new IoT Market Tracker.

The tracker provides IoT revenues across six services segments including connections, connection management, security, data analytics, platform and professional services.

“Driving China’s IoT numbers is the smart meter segment,” says Dan Shey, VP and IoT Practice Director at ABI Research. “It leads all other segments in both connections and revenues. In fact, by 2020, smart meter connections will exceed the next highest market segment in total connections by nearly 10 to 1.”

Besides smart meters, other major segments driving the Chinese IoT market will be home security and automation, OEM telematics, video surveillance, home appliances, aftermarket telematics and home monitoring. Home monitoring is expected to become an important market in China as it attempts to care for its aging population, which will reach nearly 340 million people in 2020 for citizens age 55 and older.

“Interestingly, data analytics revenues will generate the most IoT revenues in China. This statistic is reflective of the sheer volume of smart meter connections,” continues Shey.

“But it is also indicative of the relative lack of revenues in both platform and professional services in the China market. Platform revenues are not as high due to, for example, a higher share of proprietary embedded telematics deployments, especially by domestic OEM brands. Professional services revenues are similarly not as high, not only due to fewer connections in the telematics segments, with a higher proportion of tethered solutions, but also because IT and consultancy services are not as mature a market segment as in some of the more developed world markets such as Japan, South Korea and the United States.”