MWC 2014: Latin America M2M not consumer-oriented, says Pyramid

The machine-to-machine (M2M), Internet of Things (IoT) segment in Latin America is and will continue to be driven in the medium term by the industrial segment, Pyramid analyst Daniel Ramos told BNamericas.

That means Latin America will continue to see roll outs of applications aimed primarily at fleet management, smart metering, utilities, security and banking, whereas solutions for the end-user in areas such as connected cars or connected homes should flourish in a second stage.

"The main M2M activity we'll be seeing in the region in the next 12 to 18 months will be industrial solutions, because that's where the revenues are," Ramos explained. BNamericas spoke to the analyst in the sidelines of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Brazil, Argentina, Mexico and Chile are the markets where M2M is being widely deployed today, Ramos said, while Peru, Colombia and Central America should see more massive roll-outs in the next two years.

Brazil alone represents some 65% of the Latin American M2M segment in terms of connectivity and added value, the analyst underlined.

With regards to service providers, Ramos sees Telefónica(NYSE: TEF) as the operator with the most defined and developed M2M business strategy in the region.

According to a recent GSMAstudy, Latin America accounted for 8% of global M2M connections by the end of 2013, based on deployments that represent 2.1% of total mobile connections in the region. Another study, from Cisco, predicted that M2M will represent 5% of total mobile data traffic in Latin America by 2018, compared to 1% in 2013.