China's Internet of Things (IoT) services revenues will grow more than five times in the next five years, exceeding $41 billion by 2020, the fastest revenue growth rate of any country monitored by ABI Research.
"Driving China's IoT numbers is the smart meter segment," says Dan Shey, IoT practice director at ABI Research. "It leads all other segments in both connections and revenues. In fact, by 2020, smart meter connections will exceed the next highest market segment in total connections by nearly 10 to 1."
Other major segments driving the Chinese IoT market will be home security and automation, OEM telematics, video surveillance, home appliances, aftermarket telematics and home monitoring.
Home monitoring is expected to become an important market in China as it attempts to care for its ageing population, which will reach nearly 340 million people in 2020 for citizens age 55 and older.
"Interestingly, data analytics revenues will generate the most IoT revenues in China. This statistic is reflective of the sheer volume of smart meter connections," said Shey.
"But it is also indicative of the relative lack of revenues in both platform and professional services in the China market,” added Shey. “Platform revenues are not as high due to, for example, a higher share of proprietary embedded telematics deployments, especially by domestic OEM brands.”