Mobile Internet of Things market set to grow

The mobile Internet of Things market in China could reach 1.76 trillion yuan ($226.8 billion) by 2020, recent research has found.

IoT, the connection of various objects to the internet through technologies such as RFID and wireless sensor networks, would enjoy a compounded 15 percent of annual growth in the coming three years, according to a report compiled by Fudan University's School of Management released Wednesday.

In contrast to traditional IoT, mobile IoT has set a higher bar for precision in location - a prerequisite before the technology could be widely applied to empower industries with wearable devices, internet-connected vehicles and large-scale smart city endeavors, said Liu Mingyu, associate professor of Fudan University and lead author of the report.

"The technology is set to transform public infrastructures such as power grids, railways and ports, by making them inter-connected, smart, and more importantly, updating in real time," said Chen Jinpei, CEO of Qianxun SI, a cloud-based location positioning platform.

The study forecasted that by 2025, over 8 billion devices would be connected to the internet backed by the Global Navigation Satellite System, currently best known for the Global Positioning System developed by the United States.

Meanwhile, China's homegrown system BeiDou is quickly catching up, enabling wider applications in logistics, aviation, precision farming and other industries that demand high-accuracy positioning.

While the number of devices connected to the mobile IoT in Asia Pacific account for 46 percent globally, the region only obtained 22 percent of all profit generated from this sector, the report said.

"China should explore more application scenarios, such as bike-sharing, to unlock the huge potential of mobile IoT," Liu said.