IoT Alliance Australia – the industry body formed last year within Communications Alliance – is expected to emerge as an independent entity in June.
Frank Zeichner from consultancy CreatorTech, one of the original members of the think tank, co-author of the report and now a member of the executive committee, told IoTAustralia that the organisation was “achingly close” to becoming an independent entity, something which he expected to happen in June.
He would not give a specific date but said that the alliance web site was due to go live for review by members in the next few days with the aim of having it public by June 10 for an unspecified event that was “dependent on the availability of a federal minister.”
The organisation has its origins in the IoT Think Tank launched by Communications Alliance in March 2015 to examine issues thrown up by the rapid emergence of IoT. Under the auspices of Comms Alliance the think tank held a number of seminars exploring issues around IoT and published a report on IoT in Australia on 30 October 2015. That report recommended the establishment, within the think tank, of six workstreams to examine various aspects of IoT. These have since been created and are all fully operational.
IoTAustralia reported plans for the spinout in January, at which time the vision for the nascent organisation was stated as: “To be a leading IoT cross-sectoral industry body shaping and driving the advancement of IoT to harness for Australian industry the opportunities generated by the Internet of Things… [and] to define the IoT eco-system, inform and enable Australian (local and international) companies, academia and government to exploit the business opportunities afforded by IoT technology and services.”
In the past two weeks the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) has joined the alliance as an observer and the Business Council of Australia (BCA) as a member of the Executive Council. The BCA is made up of the CEOs of more than 130 of Australia’s largest companies.
Zeichner said awareness of and interest in IoT was growing rapidly in Australia: the alliance has been asked to make presentations to BCA members and to the Group of 100, whose members are drawn from the top echelon of Australia’s private and public business enterprises, and from global entities with operations in Australia.
Also, he said Engineers Australia, with over 100,000 members has formed an IoT chapter that has already attracted over 8,000 members.
Alliance members as at 26 May
Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA)
Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN)
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC)
Australian Industry Group (AIG)
Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA)
Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (AMTA)
Business Council of Australia (BCA)
Communications Alliance
Creator Tech
CSIRO
Department of Communications and the Arts (DoCA)
Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C)
Ericsson
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
Huawei
IBM
Intel
Internet Australia
Knowledge Economy Institute (KEi)
KPMG
nbn
Nokia
Office of the Australian Information Commissioner /Australian Privacy Commissioner
Optus
Telstra
