Utah's Internet of Things Un-Conference

On 24 June 2016 I drove down to Provo, Utah from Ogden to participate in the first Utah Internet of Things (IoT) Un-Conference. 

In an un-conference, interested parties first arrive, and then plan the sessions. In the end, notes from each session are published. However, the conversations throughout the day are likely far more important than the proceedings. 

I was very gratified and happy to see that my session on sustainment was well-attended and participation was brisk. 

The main graphic used during our discussion is reprinted at the end of this post. I encourage the reader to browse previous posts for more information on this sustainment model. 

For un-conference participants reading this and hoping for the charts where I broadly described ICBM operations and sustainment, they are quickly accessed via a google image search. You can also look here for a brief summary of my introduction.

I introduced the topic by discussing the aspects of ICBMs that challenged the ICBM sustainment team to create possibly the best sustainment management model ever devised. 

1. Complex System
2. Distributed Remote Sites
3. Warfighters Counting on Expected Capabilities
4. Long Lead Times Requiring Predictions of the Future
5. Funding Decision-Makers Far Removed from Day to Day ICBM Events

In turn, the Utah IoT experts and newcomers discussed how they saw their systems fitting this model. They also discussed the need to spend more effort considering potentially long lives of their systems. Some insights:

1. Sometimes our "warfighter" and "decision-makers" are the same group, we call them "customers".
2. Early ICBMs tech progressed rapidly (Thor-Atlas-Titan-MM1-MM2) until it didn't and then Minuteman III remained in use almost half a century. Same is likely happening in IoT today. 
3. IoT certainly needs to be available and reliable, but the other readiness factors depend on the system's mission. 
4. IoT can create massive amounts of data that we might use to assess, do we restrict the creation of data at the source or after we collect it? Can we afford the bandwidth?
5. Many IoT system today are not sufficient complex to need this model. But many are and more every day. 

If you were there and I failed to capture your comment (I find it hard to talk and write notes at the same time) please leave it here as a comment. It is greatly appreciated. 

For that matter, if you were not there, your comments are appreciated as well.