Samsung Commits $1.2 Billion for 'Human-Centered' IoT R&D in US

The IoT R&D will be led by the Samsung Strategy and Innovation Center, Global Innovation Center and Samsung Research America, which employs 15,000 across the country, Kwon said. The forum included discussions of the ways IoT can benefit society, plus remaining challenges “in bringing it to scale,” said Samsung.

“IoT is changing individual lives -- helping people to age in their own homes,” said Kwon, and in the future it will give “the same independence to millions of Americans” by keeping them out of hospitals and nursing homes. “As our populations live longer, these benefits and cost savings for society cannot be ignored,” he said. Kwon encouraged attendees to be “open and collaborative” and to make sure “all tools are open” to IoT innovators. “This means technologies that connect to each other, because we know that boundaries around technologies hold back innovation and scale,” Kwon said.

Kwon referenced WeatherBug and how the company is using thermostats and weather data to optimize the temperature and efficiency of U.S. homes. By 2020, the IoT could help cut carbon emissions by 9 gigatons annually, or roughly 19 percent of global annual emissions, he said. Someday, IoT could provide early warnings of earthquakes by crowdsourcing data from motion sensors in smartphones and then shut down gas lines before the quake hits, “potentially saving thousands of lives,” Kwon said.

The CEO said sector-specific regulations would lead to fragmentation in the development of IoT, “impeding devices and platforms from connecting to each other.” The IoT ecosystem is by nature connected and interwoven, making collaboration vital to its success, he said, urging his audience to pursue cross-sector dialogue and partnerships. He highlighted Samsung’s Artik IoT platform the company made available to developers, that's interoperable across operating systems and wireless standards. Innovators can use Artik to create seamless IoT solutions, he said. Kwon also cited SmartThings, which Samsung acquired in 2014, that's compatible with hundreds of IoT devices from a range of manufacturers.

Kwon announced Samsung’s role as a co-founder, with Intel, of the newly launched National IoT Strategy Dialogue, created to bring together like-minded industry partners and organizations to develop strategic recommendations for U.S. policymakers on IoT. The Dialogue, managed by the Information Technology Industry Council (ITI), will develop recommendations for U.S. policymakers on how IoT can benefit individuals, communities, innovators and the U.S. economy, said Kwon: The announcement isn’t about first steps, because the IoT is already happening, but it's time “to imagine the transformative potential of IoT for our societies -- and learn how to achieve its human, social benefits at scale.”

Launch of the IoT Strategy Dialogue coincides with Commerce Department’s IoT proceedings and the pending bicameral and bipartisan Developing Innovation and Growing the Internet of Things (DIGIT) Act (S-2607/HR-5117). Digit would establish a working group of federal agency leaders to recommend to Congress how to encourage the proliferation of the IoT in the U.S. along with industry, Samsung said. The launch of the IoT initiative “answers the call of a chorus of technology leaders seeking a forum to proactively coordinate and drive industry’s role in this process,” said the companies.

The National IoT Strategy Dialogue will lay the foundation for industry to develop strategic policy recommendations to drive U.S. IoT infrastructure investment; facilitate interoperability; foster security; promote voluntary, industry-led global consensus-based standards and best practices; leverage public-private partnerships; and enable IoT innovation to flourish, it said. Intel and ITI executives backed formation of a National IoT Strategy when testifying before Congress last year, and ITI members Intel, Samsung and others developed IoT principles for advocacy outreach with government officials, said Samsung.