Page 19 - Case Study Annual 2015

Challenges: And into the dark woods your own business going forward, the IoT will bleed
into your business regardless. As the supply chain
While there is effusive praise for the IoT and the promise grows ever more connected and your upstream and
it holds, there are challenges facing its full adoption. downstream partners look to incorporate more types
The IoT is a technological shift that forces companies, of data streams into their own systems, demands will
particularly within integrated supply chains, to become be put on your own operations to provide accordingly.
more demand-driven. While this might seem obvious,
IoT will require companies to pool data from various Similarly, for your own supply chain to be effective
sources that will likely have their own reciprocal view and responsive in what will become an increasingly
into your own organisation. demand-driven supply chain, your only recourse will
be to tap into the information being generated outside
It’s already become apparent with customers’ of your organisation. It’s worth reading about in more
increasing need to have goods delivered with detail than what we’ve discussed here, so consider
increasingly shorter lead-time and a detailed tracking checking out the Suggested Reading box as well for
of the delivery. Fortunately, there are significant some great primers on the topic. •
advantages to demand-driven logistics – reduced stock
requirements, minimising the impact By Rick de Klerk (rick.de.klerk@opsi.co.za)
of variation within the supply – and
it’s applicable at any level of supply Suggested reading
chain management though the benefits
increase depending on the maturity of • C ISCO and DHL have created an informative
your supply chain and the extent of your report on the impact of the IoT within the
IoT implementation. supply chain, along with several use cases: http://
www.dhl.com/en/about_us/logistics_insights/
The other major issue is that of security. dhl_trend_research/internet_of_things.html
Networks in industrial, manufacturing
and supply chain environments have • Issue 17 of the Deloitte Review offers extensive
typically been siloed, but the IoT insight into the IoT from a variety of perspectives.
requires a more open approach to be Of particular interest is the article, ‘The Internet
truly effective, and that presents several of Things’ potential to recast supply chain
problems. Different embedded operating management’: http://dupress.com/periodical/
systems and software, a variety of deloitte-review/
implementations with varying standards
and a need for ongoing maintenance • Ars Technica wrote a detailed feature article
in the form of regular updates creates a explaining why the IoT is the future for everyone,
potential security circus. not just the supply chain, along with pervasive
challenges with the concept as a whole: http://
There already exists several real-world cases of arstechnica.com/unite/2015/10/the-future-is-the-
embedded systems on IoT-enabled devices being internet-of-things-deal-with-it/
co-opted by malicious actors for nefarious purposes,
such as that reported by Proofpoint in January 2014
when it was observed that 750 000 malicious spam
mails were being sent by over 100 000 compromised
consumer devices with internet capabilities over the
course of several days. Obtaining access to any of the
devices in your IoT implementation means potentially
greater access to your network as a whole and the
information you’ve collected about your operations,
your partners and your customers.

Fortunately, there is some work being done towards
some standardisation and better security. OpenWrt is
a well-established and highly customisable embedded
Linux OS, while Google has announced its intention to
develop an Android-based OS called Brillo specifically
for the IoT with security in mind, along with a new
protocol for talking to other embedded OSes.

The future

Whether you begin looking into some IoT strategy for

the logistics news case study annual 2015 17