This blog is based on the analyses titled, Top 10 Growth Opportunities Across the Global IoT Market, 2026 and Inside the Minds of IoT Decision-Makers: Spending Priorities and Growth Opportunities authored by Frost & Sullivan’s growth expert, Cecilia Perez from the IoT and Edge Solutions team.
Over the last few years, Internet of Things (IoT) has become one of the most important catalysts of digital transformation and industrial automation. What began as a way to connect assets and collect data, now has a solid foundation that facilitates AI, advanced analytics, and real-time operational intelligence. With advancements in technologies like multi-access edge computing (MEC), eSIMs, private 5G, and agentic systems, organizations are gaining the ability to monitor operations continuously, respond faster to change, and unlock new levels of operational efficiency. Concepts that once felt experimental—digital twins, predictive analytics, spatial infrastructure, and autonomous decisions—are now moving into mainstream enterprise applications.
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To support this, the role of passive IoT services and platforms is expanding beyond connectivity management. Providers are embedding AI directly into platforms, software, and hardware, to convert raw device data into actionable insights that support anomaly detection, predictive maintenance, on-device inferencing, and autonomous decision-making with minimal human intervention. But as connected environments grow larger and more complex, businesses contend with wider attack surfaces, cybersecurity risks, data exposure, and device vulnerabilities. Success increasingly depends on balancing intelligence, scale, and security across the entire IoT value chain.
5 Mega Trends Every IoT Leader Should Prepare For
- Zero Trust-based Network Security: Security becomes harder to manage and monitor as IoT spreads to more devices, locations, and networks. It is no surprise then that 30% of organizations cite security and data protection as a critical challenge. This is triggering advancements in Zero Trust strategies that strengthen defense against vulnerabilities and enable continuous verification.
- Private 5G and EaaS: Businesses are looking to move mission-critical operations closer to the edge. While 28% are still evaluating MEC opportunities, 22% have already deployed private networks with MEC. Now, the emergence of Edge-as-a-Service (EaaS) helps reduce the upfront investment barriers associated with such deployments.
- Single-pane-of-glass (SPoG) and Multi-carrier Orchestration: Many IoT initiatives deliver value in pilots but become harder to manage as they grow. We find that 24% of organizations struggle because connectivity remains siloed. As a result, SPoG platforms are gaining traction by providing centralized visibility and control across devices, networks, and cloud applications.
- Native Generative AI (GenAI) in CMPs: AI is steadily moving from experimentation into day-to-day IoT operations. In 2025, 51% of businesses integrated AI and machine learning into their IoT solutions. This creates more room for AI-native connectivity management platforms (CMPs), where intelligence is embedded directly into core platform operations.
- Multi-orbit Hybrid Networks: Customer demand for diverse connectivity continues to rise, with 62% using traditional cellular, 51% cellular IoT Low-power Wide-area (LPWA), 37% satellite IoT networks, and 31% unlicensed Low-power Wide-area Network (LPWAN). This is driving greater adoption of multi-orbit hybrid networks across IoT deployments.
Do your teams have the right tools and frameworks to diversify investments across AI-enabled IoT, private 5G, and edge computing?
Strategic Imperatives for Providers
- Innovative Business Models: As IoT deployments become larger and more geographically distributed, managing physical SIMs is becoming increasingly impractical. Remote SIM provisioning (RSP) and eSIM technologies are helping remove these bottlenecks through zero-touch connectivity management. Providers that focus on innovative profile management (full-stack GSMA-native RSP and IoT-native RSP) will gain early mover advantages.
- Internal Challenges: Managing connectivity is no longer just about networks. Businesses want a unified view across devices, applications, connectivity layers, and operational workflows. Going forward, those who upgrade platforms, solutions, and go-to-market strategies in keeping with standards like GSMA’s SGP.32 can help simplify device lifecycle management, while reducing fragmentation.
- Transformative Megatrends: Reliable connectivity isn’t limited to areas served by traditional terrestrial networks. The combination of terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks is expanding IoT coverage into locations that were previously difficult or costly to connect. Providers who strengthen partnerships across satellite ecosystems and develop multi-orbit service strategies will find themselves better positioned to serve remote, mobile, and mission-critical IoT applications.
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Ways to Navigate Customer Challenges
Customers face a different set of challenges. These organizations aren’t struggling to connect devices anymore. They’re struggling to make sense of everything that comes afterward.
Enterprises have accumulated IoT deployments over time, often across different business units and technology stacks. The result is a fragmented environment where data lives in multiple systems, visibility is limited, and operational processes remain disconnected. Cybersecurity concerns continue to grow as well. Every connected asset represents a potential entry point, and attacks targeting operational environments are becoming more sophisticated. For many organizations, securing distributed assets across multiple locations has become a board-level concern.
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Best Practices for Customers |
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| Cyber threats such as Domain Name System (DNS) poisoning and Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks can compromise data integrity and disrupt business operations. | Adopt Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) architectures that converge networking and security through a centrally managed cloud-based framework. | |
| Multi-vendor environments, heterogeneous technologies, and Information Technology (IT)- Operational Technology (OT) integration challenges make large-scale IoT deployments difficult to manage. | Consolidate oversight through SPoG platforms that unify connectivity, devices, applications, and cloud environments into a common operational view. | |
| Pressure to reduce carbon emissions, improve employee safety, and meet Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) goals continues to intensify. | Invest in wireless IoT sensors and smart building solutions to optimize energy use, enhance workplace safety, and support data-driven sustainability initiatives. | |
| Another challenge is turning data into action. Companies are collecting more operational data than ever before, yet many still find it difficult to convert that information into meaningful business decisions. Data abundance does not automatically translate into business value. | Leverage AI-powered analytics and edge intelligence solutions to transform real-time data into predictive and prescriptive actions. | |
New Strategies to Capitalize on Growth Opportunities
The success of IoT increasingly depends on how organizations manage complexity at scale. Requirements around local compute, operational autonomy, data sovereignty, and lifecycle management are becoming more prominent as connected environments expand. At the same time, RSP is emerging as an important enabler of global IoT scalability, allowing organizations to manage connectivity more efficiently across diverse deployments. Against this backdrop, providers are pivoting their operating models, technology partnerships, and service capabilities to improve deployment outcomes while creating new opportunities for differentiation and long-term growth.
Competitive Benchmarking
Frost & Sullivan has growth and innovation strategies across the full IoT and Edge Services value chain. To know more about segment-specific growth opportunities, visit:
- Leveraging SPoG platforms to support end-to-end device lifecycle management, including provisioning, monitoring, updates, real-time analytics, and security and policy enforcement across increasingly complex IoT environments.
- Partnering with cloud vendors to develop turnkey private networks with integrated edge compute deployed, operated, and optimized as managed services, while working with IoT vendors to simplify application integration.
- Expanding AI and agentic systems through partnerships with leading AI players, including OpenAI, Google Gemini, and Microsoft AI. This ensures access to pre-trained models, natural-language analytics, and generative reasoning engines.
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- Book a Growth Dialog:Align your 2026 IoT strategy with Frost & Sullivan’s Growth Pipeline™ Dialog.
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- See Industry Positioning on the Frost Radar™:Benchmark your growth performance and innovation strength against other growth champions, visionary leaders, contenders, and innovators.
- Activate Brand & Demand Growth:Accelerate awareness, engagement, and revenue growth through integrated brand and demand generation strategies.
IoT and Edge: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
• How exactly does IoT work?
IoT combines sensors, connectivity, cloud or edge computing, and analytics. Devices collect data, securely transmit it over wired or wireless networks, and applications analyze the data to generate insights or trigger automated actions.
• What are the key components of an IoT solution?
A typical IoT solution includes connected devices and sensors, connectivity (cellular, Wi-Fi, LPWAN, satellite, or private 5G), IoT platforms, cloud or edge computing, data analytics, AI, and security.
• What connectivity options are available for IoT devices?
IoT devices can connect using cellular (4G, 5G, Long-term Evolution for Machines [LTE-M], narrow band [NB]-IoT), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, satellite communications, Ethernet, or private wireless networks, depending on coverage, power, bandwidth, and application requirements.
• How can businesses improve IoT security?
Organizations should implement Zero Trust security, encrypt data, authenticate devices, segment networks, regularly update firmware, monitor for threats, and manage device identities throughout the lifecycle.
