Microsoft joins with Jasper in Internet of Things alliance
The gold rush is on foe the Internet of Things as startups and tech heavyweights alike seek to cash in on a burgeoning universe of connected devices. Thus Microsoft's latest alliance with Jasper, which offers management technology for those devices.
Context & Ripple Effects
In mid-2015 the IoT land grab was running on partnerships rather than products: weeks after Microsoft signed its device-management alliance with Jasper, IBM paired with ARM on IoT data analytics across industrial, health, car, and wearable devices. Microsoft had no need to build fleet-management plumbing itself when a startup already specialized in it.
The alliance proved to be a bellwether rather than a one-off. Within months the same players were writing checks instead of contracts — Cisco paid $1.4B outright for Jasper — while Microsoft joined Qualcomm, Intel, Samsung, and Cisco in the Open Connectivity Foundation and later committed $5B to IoT R&D.
First-order effects
- Jasper gets distribution for its connected-device management platform through Microsoft's enterprise and cloud reach; Microsoft gets IoT device-management capability without an internal build.
Second-order effects
- Cisco's response is visible in the corpus: rather than partner, it acquired Jasper outright for $1.4B, converting the startup from a shared ally into a rival's asset and forcing Microsoft back onto its own stack.
Third-order effects
- Connectivity-management software becomes the contested layer of the IoT stack — cloud giants compete through alliances, standards bodies like the Open Connectivity Foundation, and acquisitions, with Microsoft's later BMW manufacturing initiative showing the same playbook extended to vertical industries.
The trend: Cloud platforms are racing to own the software layer of connected-device fleets through partnerships and acquisitions, because whoever manages the devices controls the enterprise relationship.