PETRAS academics explore mainstreaming IoT theme at IoT India Congress

Themed on mainstreaming the Internet of Things, the congress saw over 1000 participants attend a packed two-day event and was a tremendous demonstration of the vibrant tech culture in IoT in India.

Professor David De Roure, PETRAS Co-Investigator at the University of Oxford, gave the opening keynote talk, presenting the PETRAS National Centre of Excellence for IoT Systems Cybersecurity. David also reflected on the importance of the IoT community coming together, building on his experience of chairing PETRAS and the IET ‘s “Living in the Internet of Things” conferences in 2018 and 2019 in London.

There were two further PETRAS “Future tech Spotlight” talks: Dr Dave Murray-Rust, PETRAS Research Associate at the University of Edinburgh, gave a presentation on “human machine inter-agencies” in the Smart Cities session, while in the Retail session Dave De Roure reported on risk assessment work in the PETRAS Harnessing Economic Value stream, and an update on consumer IoT from a UK perspective.

While the focus was IoT, there was extensive discussion of AI and machine learning in the IoT context. This clear trend, with an emphasis on ‘the edge’, strongly resonates with the research agenda of the second phase of PETRAS.

The congress was aptly described as a ‘confluence’ – the IET has an important role in bringing stakeholders together to avoid the fragmentation that otherwise occurs through the many distinct efforts in the IoT ecosystem. Tech-focused presentations were balanced with human-centric conversations. PETRAS was privileged to bring its characteristically socio-technical thinking to such a vibrant and innovative event.