Pandemic Cuts Five-Year IoT Revenue Forecast

In its new forecast, GSMA Intelligence reassesed global IoT revenue in 2025 to $906 billion due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Earnings from professional services will be one of the hardest hit segments.

The analyst company noted in its August update even that the revised level revenue will be an almost threefold increase on 2019. Previously it expected IoT revenue to be $1.1 trillion in 2025. Analysts noted as part of their response to the pandemic, enterprises had readjusted to focus on remote access and automation, placing the short-term emphasis on software tools and cloud.

“As enterprises focus on survival, discretionary spend is currently under scrutiny to preserve cash, which negatively impacts IoT consulting revenues in particular,“ GSMA Intelligence added. “Some latent spend from 2020 will shift to 2021 and beyond, but as economic growth returns we expect IoT professional services revenue growth to return to preCovid-19 levels, with systems integration the main contributor to revenue.“

Although tempering its overall revenue forecast, it noted there would be regional variations, with Asia Pacific least affected. In several markets here, it added, IoT was being deployed in state-sponsored initiatives to mitigate the impact of the crisis. By contrast, it pointed to a bleaker outlook in Latin America. In terms of devices, it stood by numbers published in early June, stating the net increase in IoT devices would dip 45 percent in 2020.