IoT data by itself is only part of the story. There is a multitude of useful data already available to you that could be a store of hidden value. Internal datasets can be overlooked as a way to quickly enhance IoT data. They are an excellent place to start. IoT data should not be viewed in isolation; think of it as a continuation of data already stored about your company's products, customers, and processes.

Data should be combined into a 360-degree view of your business to maximize the opportunity of finding new value in it. The fastest and easiest place to start is usually (but not always) the internal datasets that you already have available.

The reason it may not always be the fastest and easiest comes from internal data security and legacy system hurdles; which can sometimes make it difficult to extract internal data to combine with IoT data. This may be a stumbling block for internal datasets, which, perhaps counter-intuitively, is not the case with external datasets. External datasets tend to be easier to obtain and have less security concerns, since they are publicly available. Either way, the potential value is still worth the effort of overcoming these hurdles.