Why Is Edge Computing Gaining Popularity Today?

In this modern era where everything is moving towards digitization, edge computing has left no stone unturned in making its way into businesses and industries. Its popularity is growing due to the huge computing demands of cloud users and massive data explosion through IoT. Business associates are finding it the best way to streamline IoT traffic and facilitate real-time, local data analysis. IIoT has paved way to move data processing closer to its source, which involves actual industrial machines. A survey says that edge computing will reach peak productivity in the very near future.

The growing innovations in AI and IoT indicate that edge computing is likely to gain maturity as well. The growing popularity of edge computing doesn’t mean cloud computing is a history. Both are equally important to the IT infrastructure. They don’t compete with each other because they are here to live forever, side by side. Michael Dell gave a statement recently on edge computing, saying, “it will be everything and everywhere, i.e. the Internet of Things, which means that ultimately it will be the Internet of Everything.” A recent report predicted that, by 2025, edge computing will capture $3.24 billion of the market globally. Industries like oil and gas, power utilities, aerospace, and automotive will benefit from edge computing when it comes to optimizing operations.

Here are a few benefits of edge computing that may prove helpful to all industries. Let's jump right in!

Security

With the growing number of IoT devices, the threats to networks and private data also increase. But edge computing provides a high level of security from these vulnerable attacks. The distribution of storage, applications, and processing is carried across a wide range of data centers and devices. This results in securing the network by making it difficult for a single disruption to intrude the network. IoT devices are vulnerable to cyberattacks, but the distributed architecture of edge computing makes it easier to seal the compromised portions instead of shutting down the network.

Speed

Speed is one of the most important reasons for industries to move towards edge computing as it increases network performance by combating latency. Since the data is processed at a local edge data center, the collected information doesn’t travel far distances. An expert says that, without the help of edge computing, digital traffic jams are almost guaranteed by 2020.

Edge computing is capable of reducing latency, which results in a speed increase at the customer’s end. Latency is measured in microseconds rather than milliseconds. This is the main reason why the speed benefits of edge computing cannot be overlooked.

Scalability

Companies looking forward to expanding their computing capabilities build a dedicated data center, which is an expensive proposition. Also, the increasing computing needs and insufficient computing resources was the main reason for the rise of edge computing. It offers scalability to the companies at an affordable cost. The combination of IoT and edge devices allows organizations to flexibly expand their computing capabilities at a low price.

Also, it eases the growth cost since the addition of new devices doesn’t impose the bandwidth demands on the network.

Versatility

Edge computing offers incredible versatility capabilities to enterprises. Companies are able to target their desired markets using local edge data centers without expensive investment infrastructure. Organizations are then able to offer efficient services with latency. The integration of new IoT devices into the edge network architecture helps to offer better facilities to end users without a change in IT infrastructure. These IoT devices compel organizations to be a part of the competing world and value the innovations, thus driving its growth.

Reliability

Along with the huge security support, it also offers reliability. Since the data centers and IoT devices are placed in the end user’s locality, there are fewer possibilities of the network getting impacted. Managing vital processing functions natively helps in effective operations of IoT devices. The massive number of edge data centers makes it very difficult for any disruption to shut the service entirely. To ensure that there is no breakdown of service, the required data is routed using multiple paths. This helps to offer unparalleled reliability.

Industrial Advantages

The advantages of edge computing are a short way for companies to progress in the future. Here are the few industries that can leverage edge computing in the future:

Autonomous Vehicles

It is very important for vehicles to react in real time for all the occurring incidents, if human drivers need to be replaced. The vehicle sensors and back-end data centers may take 100 milliseconds for the action, which might put the passenger’s life at risk. The 5G network and AI capabilities are extremely important for self-driving cars, which pave the way for edge computing in various industries.

The 5G network has an ability to deploy the computing capabilities closest to the logical edge of the network, thus, forming distributed cellular towers. This may result in high-speed data transmission between the communication towers and vehicles. This will facilitate cars to react faster than humans.

Voice Assistance

AI has extended its limit due to the voice-assistant technologies including Amazon Echo, Google Home, and Apple Siri. It is highly predicted that the year 2020 will see 30 percent of consumer interactions using voice assistant technology. These increasing consumer needs require advanced AI processing and low latency response time for the effective delivery of end-user interactions. Edge computing can enable the technology to extend its limits beyond AI’s computational power and data transmission speed.

To reduce the security risk with voice assistant technology, vendors like Amazon are enhancing their AI capabilities by deploying technology close to the edge. This leads to reducing vulnerabilities as the data doesn’t move across the network.