Brazil ranks low in IoT economic impact
Brazil ranks at the bottom of a list of several countries worldwide in terms of its ability to generate economic impact from technologies based on the Internet of Things (IoT) environment.
The report by Accenture considered 20 nations globally and Brazil ranks 17th - only Italy, India and Russia performed worse when it comes to the ability to absorb IoT technologies for overall economic advancement. China and United States top the list.
Criteria used for the report includes communications infrastructure, availability of local skills, economic openness, governmental investment in research and development, as well as the ability to transform technology capital in products and services.
Despite the challenges, Accenture predicts that IoT technologies could generate up to $40bn in business for Brazil by 2030. If the conditions were akin to countries that are investing more seriously in the technology, that figure could go up to $210bn. The Brazilian IoT market currently generates $3bn, according to IDC.
Accenture's research principal director Armen Ovanessoff told Brazilian newspaper Valor Econômico that Brazil needs to up its game in relation to IoT investment.
"Brazil needs to identify industries that need government support, such as agribusiness. It also needs to get the basics right - education, infrastructure, economic openness," Ovanessoff told Valor, adding that creating an ecosystem with connections between sectors and also promoting public-private partnerships could be a way of bringing foreign investment in IoT.
Separate research with technology buyers in Brazil shows that awareness of the benefits that IoT can bring to businesses is still very low in Brazil: some 93 percent of companies have established innovation policies in the country, but only 7 percent have IoT-related projects in their innovation pipelines.