Presented at IoT14, Alex Deschamps Sonsino (DesignSwarm and Good Night Lamp) talks about the environment for IoT startups in the UK. What do founders need to do to create viable businesses?

1. Objects in mirror are
closer than they appear.
Lessons from 10 years of #iot
@iotwatch / @GNLteam
designswarm.com / goodnightlamp.com

2. CEO of Tinker London
2007-2010
Good Night Lamp
2012-
designswarm
2011-

4. Lesson 1
Don’t waste time with
definitions
Human-Computer Interaction
Ubiquitous computing /
ubicomp
blogjects
Internet of things
Smart (insert noun)
Internet of Everything
Industrial Internet
Wearables
Connected products

5. Litmus test?

6. Lesson 2
The forbidden apple of
crowd-funding
A convenient way for investors to ignore you
early on (you may not need them anyway)
A quick way to do market research.
Not a replacement for real PR.
You become part of a market, people want
to make money from you as an entrepreneur.

7. Lesson 3
You are educating
investors.
Early days for investors who have been
investing in web for over 15 years.
Most tech investors focusing on industrial /
B2B
Consumer-focused investments are led by
US (Foundry Group/Tech Stars)

8. Lesson 4
Aqui-hires are a trend
Nest & OR make for poor examples of
success in #iot
Larger problems such as distribution &
retailing of smart products will need to be
solved by companies who stick at it.
2 years developing a product isn’t long
enough.

9. Lesson 5
Surround yourself with
experts
Supply chain & retail are known skillsets but
are different communities
Electronics engineering isn’t easy to find & is
expensive but will help design something
scalable
A 20 something or a graduate can’t help you
with either.

10. Lesson 6
Pace yourself
Incubators & accelerators are often too short
& shouldn’t put you off your course.
It takes 3 years to really be known in all
markets but also be boring to some.
Decide if you’re a one product company or a
products company. (Lava Lamp vs Apple)

11. Lesson 7
Try not to move to Silicon
Valley
Silicon Valley doesn’t have as much
engineering & marketing as the UK but it
has some money.
Open a sales office there.
Go to CES / SXSW / XOYO / FooCamp

12. Lesson 8
You’re not alone.
#iotlondon has 2.7K members
meetup.com/iotlondon
Retailers interested in new ideas (JLab)
Angel funding will catch up
meetup.com/iotangels

14. Good luck.
Lessons from 10 years of #iot
@iotwatch / @GNLteam
designswarm.com / goodnightlamp.com