Towards a Maturity Model for IoT Adoption by B2C Companies

Abstract

The fast-growing market for the adoption of IoT technologies poses serious challenges for companies providing IoT solutions. These challenges require constant technological and managerial improvement from the companies. To select the right direction for improvements, managers need appropriate tools for analysis and decision making. Recognised tools of this type are maturity models. Currently, maturity models developed for IoT adoption are mainly oriented to the business to business (B2B) market, while business to consumer (B2C) companies also need such a reliable tool for business improvement. Thus, this work is intended to fill the gap in existing research through the development of a maturity model for IoT adoption focused on the B2C market. To achieve this goal, we based our model on the scientific literature as well as on practical experience gained by leading companies in the market of IoT solutions. Moreover, the development and validation of the maturity model are carried out in close collaboration with two reputable European experts with extensive practical experience in this field. The result is a maturity model, which is a balanced, practice-oriented tool for assessing the maturity of the IoT solutions implementation and accounting for the specificity of the B2C market.