A recent report from McKinsey estimates that the IoT industry could enable $5.5 trillion to $12.6 trillion in value globally by 2030. A study by Ericsson predicts up to 24 billion inter-connected products (e.g., mobility, medical devices / healthcare, smart homes / offices, industrial equipment & more) by 2050. The key to enabling such scale and value is standards-based connectivity and interoperability. Everything will be wirelessly connected. Products will talk to each other and the back-end infrastructure, sending instructions, content, software, usage reports and much more.

Because connectivity standards are covered by patents, and every product must follow the standards, patent licensing is inevitable. The first big waves of connectivity patent licensing involved computers, cellular handsets and connected cars. The next big wave (and possible tsunami) will be IoT devices. The patent licensing revenue could run into the tens of billions of dollars. Technology developers, product manufacturers, users, joint licensing programs and governments are all gearing up to address this opportunity. But the IoT space is huge and diverse, with vastly different usage cases, value propositions, profit margins compared to handsets, computers and connected cars.

Takeaways:
• Understanding the key issues & challenges in IoT licensing
• Who are the players, and what are the strategies, opportunities & timing
• What’s old? What’s evolving? What’s new?