The billions of sensors and connected devices that make up the Internet of Things are a powerful source of business insights and competitive advantage, according to The 1610 Group founder and managing consultant Scott Lowe. He provided an overview of this topic in his latest Wikibon alert.

Lowe points that Big Data doesn’t always live up to its description: small devices tend to generate rather modest amounts of information, often for individual consumption. A prime example is Nest’s famous “Learning Thermostat,” which tracks households’ heating and cooling habits to optimize power consumption.

Most connected devices are small, but Lowe notes that there are exceptions. The Boeing 787, although hardly a “device,” generates half a terabyte of data per flight in order to help airlines address potential routine maintenance issues more proactively and effectively at the same time. This is a staggering amount of data when one takes into account that major airlines manage thousands flights of per week.

The healthcare industry is another sector that is poised to benefit from Big Data. The number of medical devices per bed is increasing at an accelerated pace, and healthcare professionals are starting to leverage data in their work. Even storage vendors such as Hewlett-Packard are building analytical capabilities into their solutions to improve customer service and maximize ROI for users.

Lowe summarizes that “the sky is the limit” for organizations that can successfully exploit the Internet of Things, Big Data, and advanced analytics. The bottom line:

“CIOs have the opportunity to help their companies create completely new revenue possibilities with the intersection we’re seeing today. It just takes an idea to get started and, with the ever increasing number of connected devices, the world is, almost literally, at your fingertips.”