After eight years of development, China's Internet of Things has made considerable progress, but it still faces some bottlenecks. For instance, the two fundamental core technologies - sensors and chips - are still subject to others' control. It also faces problems such as fragmented application scenarios, the lack of a platform for fully sharing data, and the increased difficulty in preventing cyber security. Professionals have called for China to enhance technological research and development as well as independent innovation in the field of the Internet of Things. At the same time, it should adopt more inclusive policies, innovative thinking and an open market to protect the disruption and transformation brought about by the Internet of Things.

It is expected to give rise to the Fourth Industrial Revolution

Through terminals such as computers and mobile phones, the Internet has solved the problem of information communication between people. The Internet of Things (iot) converts the physical world into the digital world through sensor devices, thereby achieving the connection between things and between people and things. In the Internet era, the data input manually is ultimately limited. Entering the era of the Internet of Things, the number of interconnected objects is growing rapidly, and objects automatically upload data. The true era of big data is approaching.

There will be no such thing as "Made In China" or "Made In USA" In the future. The manufacturing industry of the future will be "Made in Internet". Jack Ma, chairman of the board of directors of Alibaba Group, said.

He even believes that with the advent of the era of the Internet of Everything, machines are endowed with "intelligence", and in the future, all manufacturing will be carried out on the Internet. Essentially, it will become a service industry and no longer the main source of employment. On the contrary, modern service industries in the future will be the true manufacturing industry and the driving force for employment.

At the recent World Internet of Things Summit held in Wuxi, relevant officials from national ministries and commissions, local leading figures, academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, and leaders of well-known enterprises in related industries all, to varying degrees, depicted their visions for the upcoming Internet of Things era in their keynote speeches, which is on the eve of an explosion.

Wang Zhigang, vice minister of the Ministry of Science and Technology, said that the development of informatization has extended from the computer era and the Internet era to the Internet of Things era, and has included new technologies such as perception technology, big data and artificial intelligence. It is highly likely that the fourth industrial revolution will be based on this.

Jack Ma said that in the first technological revolution, coal was the main production material and the main driving force. In the second technological revolution, it was oil and electricity. This technological revolution, however, is driven by innovation. Data will become the most important production material, and computing power will become a powerful productive force.

According to experts, in the era of voice networks with billions of connections, companies like AT&T with a scale of tens of billions of dollars emerged. In the era of PC/ mobile Internet with hundreds of billions of connections, there emerged enterprises worth hundreds of billions of dollars like IBM, Microsoft, Google and BAT. The Internet of Things will achieve hundreds of billions of connections, which is an extremely imaginative market and is bound to give birth to a new generation of giant enterprises.

The global Internet of Things (iot) technology and applications are entering a period of vigorous innovation. The "2016-2017 China Internet of Things Development Annual Report" shows that currently, approximately 5.5 million devices are connected to the Internet of Things worldwide every day. In 2016, the number of global Internet of Things device connections reached 6.4 billion, an increase of 30% compared to the previous year. It is estimated that by 2021, the number of global connected devices will reach 28 billion, among which 16 billion are related to the Internet of Things.

Experts generally believe that the Internet of Things (iot) technology, which endows those objects that cannot speak with "intelligence", will lead to a new revolution in intelligent production, create new Spaces for smart living, give rise to a large number of new smart applications, promote the world's green and sustainable development, and ultimately create a more comfortable, convenient and "intelligent" life for humanity.

Zhang Lei, the chairman of Envision Energy, said that through Internet of Things (iot) technology, the physical world can be transformed into a digital one. Then, through network interconnection, production and demand can be connected in real time. Humans can conduct those fragmented energy systems like a symphony orchestra, turning them into a beautiful symphony. This is expected to significantly reduce the cost of new energy and gradually eliminate the pollution caused by fossil energy.

The two core technologies still rely on imports

In 2009, China first proposed the concept of "Sensing China". The State Council approved the establishment of the first national-level sensor network innovation demonstration zone in Wuxi. Later, it was listed as one of the country's emerging strategic industries and included in "Made in China 2025", clearly stating that it would accelerate the research and development and application demonstration of Internet of Things technology.

Luo Wen, vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, introduced that as of now, China's Internet of Things (iot) industrial ecosystem is gradually improving, forming a relatively complete iot industrial chain including chips, components, equipment, software, electrical appliance operation, and iot services. A number of key laboratories have been established, basically covering all links of iot technological innovation. The number of iot patent applications has been increasing year by year. Narrowband Internet of Things leads the world's development and its dominance in international discourse is constantly increasing.

At present, China's Internet of Things (iot) has formed a development pattern of four major regions: the Bohai Rim, the Yangtze River Delta, the Pearl River Delta, and the central and western regions. Wuxi, Hangzhou, Chongqing, and Beijing have become important bases for promoting the development of iot. Through pilot demonstrations, the Internet of Things has begun to be applied on a large scale in fields such as transportation, logistics, environmental protection, healthcare, and security. While facilitating people's lives, it has also promoted the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries.

Gao Yaguang, the vice mayor of Wuxi City, introduced that the core industry revenue of the Internet of Things in Wuxi City reached 210 billion yuan in 2016, with over 150,000 employees. The growth rate has exceeded 30% for three consecutive years, forming an industrial chain covering perception, network communication, processing and application, key commonalities, and basic support. Four months ago, Wuxi took the lead in achieving full coverage of NB-IoT (Narrowband Internet of Things) across the country. As of the end of August this year, the number of Internet of Things (iot) device connections in Wuxi exceeded that of mobile phone users for the first time.

Academician Wu Hequan of the Chinese Academy of Engineering said that in the past few years, most of the applications of the Internet of Things have been carried out by small enterprises. Since the release of the narrowband Internet of Things (NB-iot) standard last year, a number of large enterprises have begun to get involved in the development of the Internet of Things, such as Huawei, ZTE, the three major telecommunications operators, Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, JD.com, Suning, etc. They are all following up and making plans. This is expected to promote the great development of the Internet of Things and shift from government-led to market-driven.

However, experts also point out that the development of the Internet of Things in our country still faces some bottlenecks, the most prominent of which are the two fundamental core technologies - sensors and chips.

According to the "2016-2017 Annual Report on the Development of China's Internet of Things", the research and development of new sensor products in China lags behind that of developed countries by nearly 10 years. Currently, about 60% of them rely on imports, and almost all micro-electromechanical system sensors are imported, with over 80% of core chips being imported.

The development of the Internet of Things must lay a solid foundation. First, efforts should be made to ensure the localization of network chips. Second, China should take the lead in network standards. Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and vice president of Tsinghua University, You Zheng, believes that this not only involves safety issues but is also closely related to the national economy. One cannot plant trees oneself but let others eat the fruits.

The United States recently banned an investment fund with Chinese capital background from acquiring Lattice Semiconductor, an American chipmaker, on the grounds of safeguarding national security. Some people believe that security is merely an excuse, and the real intention behind it may still lie in protecting the United States' leading edge in fields such as artificial intelligence, semiconductors, chips and advanced materials.

In addition, the fragmentation of application scenarios, the lack of a platform for fully sharing data, and the increased difficulty in preventing cyber security are also issues that urgently need to be addressed and resolved in the current development of the Internet of Things in China.

At present, in terms of Internet of Things (iot) technology, generally speaking, China and the world are still in a stage of running side by side. In the future, it is entirely possible for China's iot to shift from following, accompanying, or even taking the lead in some fields. Experts analyze that the Internet of Things (iot) industrial chain is mainly divided into the perception layer, network layer, platform layer, and application layer. Although there is still a certain gap between China and some developed countries in the perception aspect, China is catching up in other aspects. Moreover, China has a huge advantage in the application market. By driving technological development through applications and then supporting applications with technological development, China's Internet of Things industry will witness explosive growth.

According to professionals, the large-scale application of Internet of Things (iot) technology in some fields has led to a significant reduction in the costs of some sensors, chips, software, etc., with some reductions even reaching over 95%. For instance, the cost of narrowband Internet of Things terminals is expected to drop to 3 US dollars, a reduction of 70%.

"Technological development is also a spiral upward process." " Looking back on the development of the Internet of Things (iot) in China, relevant professionals say that when iot was first introduced to China and a demonstration zone was established in Wuxi, there was a high fever for iot, but it gradually cooled down and is now entering a relatively stable and rapid development stage.

Large-scale application calls for more inclusive policies

Relevant experts point out that the Internet of Things integrates and connects existing industrial fields and element resources through mutual penetration, integration or fission, achieving the extension or breakthrough of the industrial value chain, making industrial boundaries increasingly blurred. This will make cross-border integration a major trend in industrial development, and further give rise to a large number of new business forms and new models.

The textile industry has always been regarded as a typical labor-intensive industry. The Wuxi Cotton Textile Group, which has a history of nearly a hundred years, has overturned this notion.

In the Yangtze River workshop of Wuxi No.1 Cotton, rows of machines are running at high speed, but it is hard to find any workers. Data shows that after intelligent transformation, the number of workers per 10,000 spindles at Wuxi No.1 Cotton has been reduced to less than 15, and the work efficiency has reached the world-class level.

The intelligent transformation of Wuxi No.1 Cotton is closely related to the Internet of Things technology. During the renovation, tens of thousands of sensors were installed on the factory equipment. With the help of these sensors, not only was the automatic control of the equipment achieved, but also production data could be collected online, enabling the automatic generation of production reports, online quality monitoring, and real-time order tracking.

Relevant professionals believe that a large number of cheap laborers were once an important advantage in the process of China's economic development. Nowadays, this advantage is gradually fading away, which was once a cause for concern. However, from the perspective of the development trend of the Internet of Things, the era of "unmanned economy" is approaching, with unmanned factories, unmanned logistics, unmanned retail... In the future, "unmanned" smart manufacturing may be another advantage.

Bicycles, which were once marginalized, have once again become the focus of development in a short period of time thanks to the new business model of sharing economy, and behind this is the support of Internet of Things technology.

"Where am I?" "Who is using me?" "How long and how far have I been cycling?"... With the help of a series of sensors and chips, Internet of Things (iot) technology endows bicycles with the ability to self-perceive and self-upload data, connecting each vehicle to the background and bringing about a brand-new sharing economy model.

Envision Energy, a wind turbine manufacturer, is also a case in point. Envision Energy initially incorporated various sensing devices into wind turbines, aiming to collect relevant data to improve turbine manufacturing and endow the turbines with self-learning and self-adaptive capabilities. Today, the vast amount of data collected by sensor devices has opened up a new industry for Envision Energy - intelligent energy management.

The Internet of Things can also revolutionize environmental management methods and enhance social governance capabilities. Traditional environmental supervision is affected by human and material resources and has blind spots in time and space. Environmental protection departments and environmental violations are often in a state of "cat catching mouse", only able to respond passively to environmental damage. With the help of Internet of Things (iot) technology, enabling self-monitoring and automatic reporting of the ecological environment will fundamentally transform the current environmental governance system.

In Wuxi, the environmental protection department has set up a "tight net" for environmental monitoring by using Internet of Things technology. It interconnects all the air stations, water stations, noise automatic stations, pollution sources and other units in the city through multiple types of sensors. When the pollutants in a river exceed the standard, the system will display the information of all enterprises that discharge into the river and precisely identify the polluting enterprises. Meanwhile, the system senses and transmits up to 300G of environmental data every day. After analysis by the background, it can form an environmental risk early warning report, guiding regulatory authorities to respond in advance.

Experts say that as Internet of Things (iot) technology enters the stage of large-scale market application, the number and quality of samples will further improve. The aggregation and analysis of big data will help social governance, including environmental supervision, upgrade from passive handling to active intervention.

The mattress can inform the nursing staff of the patient's heart rate and sleep quality. Patients with chronic diseases can measure their blood pressure and blood sugar at home, and family doctors can know the relevant data in real time on their mobile phones. Wearing an RFID bracelet, patients do not need to speak. Nurses can approach the terminal to understand the patient's condition and care requirements...

Zhao Yang, the vice president of Wuxi Third People's Hospital, said, "From surgery to nursing, from drug management to medical waste disposal, from family doctors to the establishment of medical alliances, the Internet of Things has permeated every aspect of medical care. In the future, the operation mode of hospitals may undergo disruptive changes."

"Today, the 'pain points' in life might just be the' breakthrough points' of the Internet of Things." " Industry insiders analyze that the Internet of Things may bring about a huge disruption to real production and life, such as difficulty in seeing a doctor, traffic congestion, and heavy pollution... The "side effects" and "urban diseases" brought about by industrialization and urbanization may no longer be problems in the future.

However, precisely because of this disruptive nature, in the development process of the Internet of Things, more inclusive policies are needed, a more open market is required, various tangible and intangible barriers need to be broken down, and a more open, collaborative and shared industrial ecosystem is needed.

Take driverless technology as an example. The current policy does not allow driverless vehicles to be on the road, but the problem is that if they cannot be on the road, driverless technology may never be able to improve and perfect itself through self-learning in the laboratory.

All kinds of "red flag bills" should be avoided. Jack Ma said that this bill, in order to protect the coachmen from losing their jobs, stipulated that the speed of the car must not exceed that of the carriage, which directly deprived the UK of a development opportunity. However, Germany, France and the United States seized this opportunity, making themselves a country on wheels and driving the oil economy.

Industry insiders believe that the development of the Internet of Things is a continuous process of tolerating mistakes and trying new things. They look forward to the relevant national departments embracing the new era of the Internet of Things with a more inclusive attitude and a more forward-looking perspective.