Originally published at: The 12 Layers of IoT - Golioth
When I started at Golioth, I wanted to understand the service offerings from different companies in the space. What resulted, was a chart (below), slideshow (below), and a presentation I have now given a couple different times (video, above). All of these things showcase how I started to investigate and understand the inter-operating pieces of any modern Internet of Things (IoT) system. Only 12 Layers? Let’s start with the obvious: I could have chosen just about any number of layers to explain IoT systems. I chose to highlight the pieces of IoT systems as someone working on building Reference Designs, which have a Device component and a Cloud component. I framed many of these capabilities from the perspective of my time at Golioth and the aspects of the system that I found to be crucial to a deployment. I wanted to understand the competitive landscape as a starting point (finding other companies providing IoT platforms) and expanded from there. I stopped at 12, because that is roughly the amount I thought I could describe without audience members falling asleep. 12 layers also captures a good amount of functionality. However, it misses many other pieces of IoT implementation and very easily could have been the 100 layers of IoT. The Chart The true beginning of this talk was a diagram I created. It shows how I understood offerings from different IoT providers, with varying levels of “vertical integration” (how much of the solution they provide to their users). Some providers go all the way from the hardware up to the Cloud. Some provide key infrastructure pieces (like Golioth) and point you at external providers in order to give you more flexibility.…