25 Innovative IoT Companies and Products You Need to Know The internet of things has an huge future but don't underestimate how much it is changing the world right now.
By Angela Ruth Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
The Internet of Things (IoT) continues to evolve and expand in terms of the number of companies, products, and applications that illustrate just how beneficial it is becoming to connect our devices, appliances, homes, and vehicles together. Some companies like Nest have led the way and are becoming instantly recognizable.
Waiting in the wings are numerous IoT companies you may not yet be familiar with but that could enhance how you work and live like these 25 innovative IoT firms and products:
1. SkyBell
SkyBell offers an award-winning smart video doorbell that allows you to see, hear, and speak to visitors whether you are at home or away.
This smart doorbell sends live HD video to your smartphone with the free mobile app for iOS and Android-based devices. It also has full-color night vision and a motion sensor that alerts you to a visitor at your door even if they don't press the doorbell button. SkyBell is the only video doorbell partnered with some of the top security providers in the world, including Honeywell and Alarm.com.
Related: 3 Ways Entrepreneurs Are Making IoT More User-Friendly
2. Deako
Deako is quickly becoming a leading provider of smart light switches, thanks to beautiful design, innovative engineering and prices that fall below their competition.
Their Bluetooth-enabled smart switches make it easy for homeowners to upgrade to smart lighting - allowing users to control any light in their home from a switch, smartphone or their voice. And best of all, Deako smart light switches don't require a separate hub.
3. June
This IoT company offers an intelligent convection oven that identifies what you are cooking with a camera and offers suggestions on how to make it. You can also track the cooking process from your phone, watch, or any other connected device.
Cooking smarter meals tastier meals and no mistakes on timing and temperature.
4. Particle
This IoT hardware company provides a platform for connecting IoT devices to securely connect to the Web and create a network to leverage all the benefits of this technology.
Over 100,000 developers are using Particle to build their enterprise and startup IoT devices and working as a community to collaborate on how to advance its application across industries.
Related: Connected Home Might Be the Next Big Thing But Connected Pet Is Big Right Now
5. MyMDBand
This is a wearable digital device is actually a medical emergency bracelet. MyMDband provides medical information about the wearer and uses GPS and location information to adapt the information to the local language when the wearer has any type of medical emergency. A caregiver can scan a laser-engraved QR code on the band's buckle to get health information about the wearer.
This information could include any prior medical conditions, allergies, current medications, last medical tests, and vaccinations. The IoT medical emergency bracelet also automatically alerts emergency contacts, providing updates on the wearer's location and situation.
6. Roost
This IoT device company offers a way to take care of some typically annoying home issues. Its smart smoke alarm battery stops all those chirps that remind you that it's time to change the smoke alarm battery (which usually happens in the early morning hours. In fact, you can use its smart smoke alarm as well.
Plus, the company provides leak detection sensors that help protect your home with water leak and freeze alerts.
7. Jasper
The company offers a cloud-based IoT SaaS platform for startups, small and medium-sized businesses, and large companies to launch, manage, distribute, and monetize their IoT products and services. Jasper essentially is an IoT solution for IoT businesses across numerous industries and segments to rapidly and cost-effectively deploy IoT so more companies can adopt this way of working together.
Applications include mobile service management, billing and business automation, and support diagnostics as well as much more.
Related: How Small-Business Owners Should Be Using IoT
8. Samsara
Offering industrial and fleet applications, this IoT data platform provides assistance with energy monitoring, asset utilization, and vehicle tracking.
For industrial uses, Samsara offers remote and power monitoring as well as cold chain while fleets can leverage features like dash cam, GPS tracking, trailer tracking, and more.
9. Hologram
This IoT company is a cellular connectivity platform that enables IoT device connectivity. Those with fleets can improve their management of all assets and drivers while numerous types of companies can benefit from the ability to capture and assess device data from those IoT devices that are linked.
10. Awair
This IoT company has various products, including Awair Glow, which is an air monitoring device with a smart plug. It provides multiple benefits for consumers that use these IoT products. The air monitoring aspect of the device tracks toxins and chemicals in the air and then offers a recommendation on how to improve the air quality.
The insights and tips are delivered on its app. It also attaches to other devices like Google Home or Amazon Echo so it will turn on things like humidifiers that are connected to your home network.
11. TP-Link
The IoT company offers its Smart Wi-Fi LED bulb with color-changing hue to help you reduce energy consumption while controlling your lighting at home. While it connects directly to your home Wi-Fi you can also control it from anywhere through the Kasa app so you can adjust color and brightness, track your energy consumption, and set schedules for when it's on.
It is also compatible with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant as well as Android and iOS devices.
Related: 3 Ways Entrepreneurs Are Making IoT More User-Friendly
12. Talkies
This IoT toy company was seen on "Shark Tank" and has been growing in popularity as a way for kids to chat with friends and family without having to give them a phone.
Messages can be sent from the phone app to a talkie toy or two talkie toys can be used to message each other. It's a fun and safe way to get kids into conversations and away from their screens.
13. Ray
Ray offers a glimpse of what the future of television remotes looks like with this smartphone platform that works with hundreds of devices so you don't need all those remotes anymore.
Besides controlling all your entertainment devices, it offers a recommendation engine that learns from what you choose to watch so it can help you find more programs and content like those preferences.
14. Cujo
The IoT company offers a smart firewall that protects your connected home, securing all devices that are connected from hackers and other threats. Parents can also use this device to monitor and control what their kids have access to online to keep them safe.
The security levels are akin to the security systems a business would use to protect its devices.
Related: How Startups Can Capitalize on IoT's New Co-Economy
15. Arrayent
The IoT cloud-based platform is now being used by many brands to get connected and get closer to their customers. This includes connecting products as well as business processes and departments.
The platform also provides a way to share all the data is collected in a way that an entire company can easily access and analyze together for greater collaboration and insights.
16. Sonos
This is a connected home speaker known as Play:5 that offers incredible sound and that connects to all types of device. It streams music over Wi-Fi rather than Bluetooth so the music will continue playing from your smartphone even if you pick up a phone call. This technology illustrates how you can conveniently bring all your entertainment together for an incredible sound experience.
17. Invoxia Triby
This is a smart portable speaker that you can stick on your refrigerator or leave it anywhere in the home that offers Alexa voice service. You can leave digital messages and doodles for your family, set alarms, pair it with your phone to do hands-free calls, control home devices, ask for news, get information from the Internet and play music.
Related: 3 Major Enterprise App Improvements to Watch For
18. Buddy
Buddy Ohm is a full monitoring solution that can be used to manage all IoT data. It includes Internet of Things (IoT) class hardware, scalable data infrastructure, an operations portal, dashboards, and mobile connectivity.
Businesses can use this IoT device to get more insights from all the data that is available through analysis after connecting all types of devices together.
19. Eight
This interesting company combines your sleep with data. Want to sleep better? Eight is the bed that tells you how.
The Eight Smart Cover is a sensor layer that fits over any mattress and instantly turns your bed into a smart bed. Receive daily sleep reports each morning, use the dual zone warming feature to make your bed extra cozy, connect to almost any wi-fi enabled device in your home.
20. Flex
The product design company builds intelligent products for the IoT environment across numerous industries and applications. It uses a process called Sketch-to-Scale to help businesses enjoy the advantages of intelligent products and platforms that leverage the power of creating connections and networks between products to yield even more benefits.
21. Singlecue
This IoT device allows you to control your home through the use of gestures versus all the voice-assisted IoT devices now available. It removes the need to use any remote control devices, works with over 100,000 devices to connect them, and offers a fast, effective way to send commands with a wave of your hand.
Related: America's Obsession With the Automobile Is Changing With the Times
22. Lantronix
Lantronix focuses on helping more companies adopt IoT into their processes and building models by creating IoT building blocks like embedded Wi-Fi and IoT gateways. The result is faster connectivity to realize the benefits of greater connectivity for a number of sectors, including industrial, healthcare, fleet, security, energy and more.
23. Kinsa
Kinsa offers an IoT thermometer that does so much more to track your well-being from illness back to feeling good again. While your traditional thermometer only reports your temperature, the Kinsa smart thermometer also offers personalized guidance on how to treat the temperature, advises when to contact a physician, reminds you when to take medicine and how much, shows what illnesses are in the geographic area and maintains your family's health details so you can access them from anywhere.
Related: How Startups Can Be Invited to the Big IoT Party
24. Click and Grow
This is a truly unique IoT application that involves creating and managing an indoor herb garden, flower garden, or edibles garden. The garden is self-watering and involves just plugging it in and letting technology do the rest. It's a great way to illustrate the ability to create self-sustaining environments anywhere.
25. Losant
The Losant IoT platform is a middleware solution that is helping more companies build their own IoT systems for their business models. The IoT platform includes an intelligence engine, device management and connectivity, data visualization and analytics, workflow engine, and end-user application experience.
An IoT Revolution
These 25 IoT companies -- from innovative consumer products now available to industrial and commercial hardware and platform development -- it's clear that IoT continues to expand and provide an exciting future of how connectivity can improve work and life productivity while ensuring that data and personal details are protected.
