User groups in Nordic IoT Centre
There are more than ten billion IoT devices worldwide. The technology is mature and ready for use, but these devices must create value in businesses and society to have a justified existence.
Many businesses and public institutions share this challenge. They would like to use IoT, so it provides the desired value – and they want to use the technology in a safe and appropriate way. A key element in maturing the use of IoT is collective experience building and therefore Nordic IoT Centre has created the ‘IoT user groups’ as a basis for the collective IoT experience building in Denmark. So, if you want to ensure the full benefit of IoT for your organisation – based on the best possible approach to IoT – then become a member of one of our IoT user groups.
In short, you will get the following membership benefits:
- A professional network of specialists who use IoT
- 4-6 professionally facilitated online and physical meetings
- Digital platform with an IoT knowledge library
- Exchange of experience on IoT application in relation to:
- Strategy
- Business cases
- Technical cases
- Organisational implementation
- Structured overview of the largest IoT vendor network in the Nordic region
As member of an IoT user group, you will naturally be involved in deciding which specific IoT topics and themes your user group will work on. To become a member please fill out our contact form here.
Read more and become a member of the user groups here
Background
Several national and international studies have been undertaken on the distribution and application of IoT. They all point out that organisations share the same challenges when it comes to using IoT.
These are challenges such as lack of business and technical cases, lack of management support, organisational handling of development and operation, handling of data, etc. However, the studies also show that the challenges cannot be solved generically but must be solved in context of the application domain.
For example, a business case within transport cannot as such be transferred to building operations. Therefore, the purpose of the user groups is to create a knowledge and experience forum to help organisations within the relevant application domain to break down common barriers for using IoT, to increase the benefits and the overall use of IoT in your organisation and make your organisational approach to IoT as efficient as possible.
To achieve this, it is necessary to create a safe and confidential space where you can learn from each other’s experiences and those of other relevant organisations.
Themes discussed in the groups
The group members choose which themes and topics the group would like to work on. NIoTC has suggested some topics that can be used as a starting point, but it is up to the members to choose which topics are relevant to them.
IoT as part of the business strategy
IoT and business models
Business cases
Technical cases
Development of IoT solutions
Operation of IoT solutions
Data use
Data application
Ecosystem and market solutions
Application domains and members
The user groups are divided into fields of application to make discussions as relevant as possible. A user group consists of members from organisations that use IoT within a given application domain to provide their core services. 12 IoT application domains have been identified that will each have their own user group:
Upcoming groups
- IoT in lifestyle products
- IoT in health equipment and aids
- IoT in packaging
- IoT for production optimisation
- IoT for logistics and transport optimisation
- IoT for experimental, laboratory and research management
- IoT for event and participant management
- IoT for supply distribution
You can join an established user group on their respective pages. If you would like to help establish one or more of the other user groups, please sign up here.
The yearly cycle of a user group
As a member of NIoTC, you are usually invited to six meetings – organised in a process that alternates between physical and online meetings, depending on what is optimal in relation to purpose and theme. Generally, the physical meetings contain a strong element of inspiration, development, discussions of challenges and network, while online meetings have a stronger focus on knowledge dissemination, qualification and status of work on chosen themes.
The user groups meet 4-6 times a year, typically as follows:
- 2-3 physical part-time meetings hosted by one of the members or at NIoTC
- 2-3 online meetings
- 1 physical joint meeting with the other user groups (½-1 day)
The experience of countless network groups is that the benefits for the individual are largely dependent on a good facilitation of the group. Therefore, the intention is that all user groups have their own facilitator (but one facilitator may well have several user groups). It will be a facilitator who is professionally strong in the IoT field, so that s/he can understand and assess all aspects of IoT application. The facilitator must also be experienced in facilitating groups. For NIoTC, choosing the right facilitators is crucial to the success of the user groups.
Membership benefits
NIoTC has already built up several of the above elements when NIoTC was established. In the future, these will be made exclusively available to members:
- IoT cases – with more than 50 already completed IoT cases that can provide useful learning and inspiration
- The knowledge library – where you can find articles and reports on IoT business design and the use of IoT
- The development ecosystem – which gives you an overview of all vendors associated with NIoTC using NIoTC's own ecosystem model with the roles that the individual vendors can undertake in an IoT project
- Access to the IoT research environments in Denmark. FORCE Technology, the Alexandra Institute and the leading IoT environments at the Danish universities are already part of NIoTC. In other words, as a company you get access to the best IoT experts that Denmark offer