In the company's latest forecast update on M2M, published this week, IDC argues that the convergence of device networking, M2M communication, and the Internet has brought us several steps closer to the vision of a "smart world," consisting of an "Internet of things" enabled by an intelligent infrastructure linking objects, processes, information, and people.
Several market advances over the past 12 months are driving the next wave of computing evolution with machine-to-machine at its core, according to IDC.
"The M2M market is rapidly recovering from the recessionary macroeconomic climate of 2008–2009, which primarily impacted the hardware business," said IDC Research Director Nicholas McQuire. "In 2010 we have seen a solid turnaround driven by price reductions but also a tighter integration of M2M solutions across what is still a fragmented ecosystem. Although the market has a ways to go, improvements in standards are also helping. These trends will continue to drive strong momentum in the M2M ecosystem over the next few years."