LIVE FROM IOT TECH EXPO GLOBAL 2019, LONDON: BT argued IoT and 5G are part of the same dynamic, a factor the company plans to employ to drive a connectivity revolution across sectors in its domestic market.

In a presentation, here, BT Enterprise director of strategy Guillaume Sampic (pictured) highlighted the potential for 5G to change the landscape altogether in the UK and Ireland, with the capability to “go after billions of connected devices”.

Sampic said the company was particularly excited about 5G because it was the first standard designed “not just for mobile”, with the specification “a revolution for both mobile and fixed products” along with IoT.

He further highlighted the “transformative” potential of 5G as a whole in terms of ongoing development of new use cases and benefits.

“There will initially be increased speed and capability, and that is great news from smartphones and smartphone users. But, the later features are equally exciting, such as lower latency, more scale, more sensors. There will be transformation now, and transformation up to five years from now.”

Business focus
Sampic said BT Enterprise currently serves and partners 1.2 million businesses in the UK and Ireland, supporting 5 million connections.

Digital transformation continued to emerge as a major requirement across small, medium and large enterprises, he noted, with companies looking at BT to provide relevant insights to drive smarter operations, as well as tap into a huge wealth of data being generated to “unlock its value and drive a step change in the business”.

BT Enterprise’s customers “want to use IoT and data solutions to improve customer experience and use it to create new business models”.

However, he added that across its customer base, it was security that remained the biggest concern.

“To drive digital transformation at scale, enterprises need and want the right risk control around security…this is important to drive cloud and IoT adoption.”