IoT Career Opportunities
Careers in IoT
According to multiple reports, The IoT market is estimated to reach a value of a staggering USD 1,721,231.5 Million By 2027, and more than 60 billion devices shall be connected to the internet! It means that IoT is booming at an exponential rate.
It is both good and bad. We know the good part – IoT offers simple, efficient, and reliable solutions to problems. The bad part, however, is that IoT is also affecting our lives in a bad way. For example, people are becoming unemployed as machines are replacing humans.
But what if I tell you IoT is also creating new job opportunities? Yup, with the oncoming of IoT, there are numerous fields in which you can work hand in hand with IoT. Here are 8 high-level and most popular IoT career domains.
1. Data Analytics
Data analytics is one of the IoT careers aimed at making sense of the data you collect using IoT devices.
We all know that IoT devices constantly communicate with each other and exchange data. An IoT system sends, receives, analyses, and stores data. To handle this data, you must be strong in statistical understanding, find correlations, tabulate your findings in graphical forms and have knowledge of working with statistics-based languages.
These languages include R and SAS and some Python libraries like NumPy, MatPlotLib, Pandas, and many more. A person with all these skills is precious in data analytics.
2. Networking
In IoT, the hardware setup to deploy solutions can get complex as the huge chunks of sensors and wires are rigged up to different peripherals and ports. It means that even if a single wire/connection fails, the machine may either not work as desired or not work at all.
This is why we need a Network Architect. The IoT world needs many professionals specializing in network setup and networking to make sure that all the connections work well. Employees in this field should be capable of designing an efficient network architecture that is foolproof of several wiring problems and follows all the communication protocols effectively.
3. Security
It is needless to say that security is IoT’s biggest disadvantage. In the case of a Data Breach, cybercriminals can steal all of the personal and sensitive data stored in the devices and maybe even expose it.
This is why one of the IoT Jobs is dedicated to securing your devices. If IoT security is compromised and a cybercriminal gains control of one device, the network eventually becomes vulnerable, and all your data is at risk.
The professionals working in this domain are responsible for doing regular testing and challenging the integrity of the system with various techniques, finding and fixing security flaws wherever the system fails, and putting the entire process of using an IoT device under a smooth and secured connection environment.
4. Hardware Management
A device’s “smartness” does not solely depend on its connection to the network. It is much more than that. Industries need to modify their devices to fit the networks and work accordingly. Although it’s mostly an integration of several sensors and transmitters, it is one of the core jobs in the IoT industry.
If you want to work in this domain, you need to know how to work with different sensor modules, transmitters, protocols, and integrators like Zigbee, BLE, etc. You must also be up to date with working towards any new device/technology that enters the mainstream.
5. User Interface
We know that the UI lets us interact with the devices. Even though this job may seem easy to design compared to the jobs mentioned above, it requires a lot of creativity as it is the UI that would sell your product in the market.
The truth is that a regular customer may only understand some of the device’s specifications but would leverage their choices based on how comfortable it is to use it. It is why an interactive and eye-catching UI providing all the controls to customers and understanding is one of the selling points of your IoT product.
As a UI developer, your goal should be to ensure that users get the best experience with your creativity and design skills. To achieve this, you should be able to put yourself in your customers’ shoes and understand and fulfil their requirements.
6. Sensors
Sensors convert information obtained in the outer world into data for analysis. These include data regarding the process or environmental surroundings like temperature, fluid flow in the pipe, air quality, and more.
When you want a job in this field, you must be well-versed in setting up the right type of actuators or sensors that serve well for the application and meet your system’s design specifications and power requirements.
You must also test different tools and continuously pick the most optimum solution for any application. Moreover, you must also research and stay up to date with the industry and research technologies.
7. Embedded Program Engineer
This is another domain dedicated to hardware. It is the most important component of your IoT device since it handles the software and control code. To be an embedded program engineer, you must be able to design several PCBs that match the utility of the problem under consideration and access the device’s firmware to program certain predefined and non-negotiable functions to access the networking of your device across.
8. Artificial Intelligence
Combining IoT with powerful artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms can do some high-level stuff. This is why AI and ML skills become essential when the task involves big data analysis and deriving findings.
If you want to create smart applications over huge volumes of data, AI and ML will help in the long run. To get a job in this domain, you need to understand algorithms designed in AI and ML and have an understanding of plotting libraries to represent data efficiently.
9. platform developer
An IoT developer provides production support while helping drive the technical design, ongoing configuration, testing, and maintenance of IOT applications.
This role also demands serving as the subject matter expert for Kepware, Canary Historian ThingWorx, and many other platforms. As a platform developer, you should also create support documentation, design documents, training materials, job aids, etc.
10. Cloud engineer
Today, an IoT cloud engineer must be experienced in Azure cloud IAAS, PAAS, and SAAS offerings specifically around the IOT Domain. he/she must also have knowledge of emerging tech services such as computer vision, etc.
A cloud engineer must also be well versed in Edge and Cloud Technology competencies e.g. Docker, multi-tenancy, Web-Protocols, and Demonstrated programming in Python, C#, Kubernetes, and Grafana.
Expertise in Cloud computing, with implementation experience in either of Azure(preferred), AWS or any other IoT cloud along with Network technologies protocols including MQTT, REST, AMQP, HTTPS, and WebSocket, is very highly appreciated.
Notable Skills to Become an IoT Developer
Here are some skills you can learn to become an IoT developer and work in one of the most booming modern technologies ever.
1. Understand the Linux operating system and its numerous processes of file handling/ management and process control.
2. Have prior experience with wireless stacks like Zigbee Thread, or BLE-Mesh.
3. know about writing business logic on embedded environments using test-driven methodology on RTOS and non-RTOS platforms.
4. Knowledge of communication protocols like I2C, SPI, 1-wire, UART, MODBUS, DALI.
5. Being excellent in communication, problem-solving, and analytical thinking.
6. Have in-depth technical knowledge in working with 32-bit ARM cortex M3/M4 controllers.
7. Pro efficient in programming languages like C, C++, Python, Java, and other concepts like Object Oriented Programming, Data Structure Algorithms, and more.