Cisco, Sony Deals Herald Internet Of Things M&A Boom, Says Report
Cisco Systems ’ ( CSCO ) purchase of Jasper Technologies and Sony’s acquisition of chipmaker Altair Semiconductor could be the start of an Internet-of-Things buying spree in 2016, says a Strategy Analytics report. “IoT M&A activity could potentially reach the $20 billion mark in 2016,” says Strategy Analytics. IoT refers to wireless technology that connects industrial, medical, automotive and consumer devices to the Web. Cisco agreed to buy IoT software platform provider Jasper for $1.4 billion last week. Privately held Jasper’s CEO, Jahangir Mohammed, will run Cisco’s new IoT software business unit. Sony ( SNE ) in late January agreed to buy Israel-based Altair for about $212 million. Altair makes low-power, high-performance modem chips and related LTE technology, a 4G smartphone standard. In many cases, IoT involves analysis of data streams sent from sensor-equipped devices. AT&T ( T ) in January said it would partner with Cisco, Ericsson, General Electric ( GE ), IBM ( IBM ), Intel ( INTC ) and Qualcomm ( QCOM ) to expand its “smart cities” initiative for Web-connected devices. Verizon Communications ( VZ ), meanwhile, has developed software tools for IoT applications. The Strategy Analytics report says that security will be a big issue for companies deploying IoT systems. The report forecasts strong growth in IoT-related analytics software.