AI system for remote patient monitoring
- 20%
- reduction in clinical decision-making time
IoT Application Development Company
IoT application development that survives the jump from 10 devices to 2,000.
Connected devices generate data. Most of it sits in silos, a fleet tracker that doesn't talk to your dispatch system, sensors on a production line with no integration to your MES, wearable devices with no clinical dashboard to surface the data.
We build the software that makes connected devices useful. IoT platforms, device management layers, real-time data pipelines, and the dashboards and alerts that turn sensor data into operational decisions. Fixed cost, production-ready.
IoT platforms connecting devices, data pipelines, and downstream systems
Real-time dashboards and alerting built around your operational workflows
Device management, OTA updates, and fleet monitoring for connected deployments
Fixed project cost, scoped before development starts
Recent outcomes
Connected device integration · Healthcare, US
20% faster clinical decisions
Built a platform ingesting real-time data from wearable CGM and blood-pressure monitors for remote patient monitoring.
4.9
on ClutchThe problem
Sound familiar?
Device data sitting in manufacturer portals with no integration to your operations systems?
No real-time visibility across your connected fleet, just periodic exports and manual reconciliation?
The pilot worked with 10 devices on a desk. Do you actually trust it at 2,000 in the field?
Short answer
IoT application development is building the software layer that connects physical devices to the systems that use their data: device management, real-time data pipelines, and the dashboards and alerts that turn sensor data into operational decisions. RaftLabs builds custom IoT platforms for clients across the US, UK, Europe, Canada, GCC, South Africa, and Southeast Asia. A focused platform starts at $55,000 and typically ships in 12-16 weeks at a fixed cost.
Key takeaways
- IoT application development is the software layer that turns device data into operational decisions, not the hardware itself.
- Most IoT builds ship to production in 12-16 weeks at a fixed cost, scoped before development starts.
- 21.1 billion IoT devices were connected worldwide in 2025, up 14% year-over-year (IoT Analytics).
- We built a remote patient monitoring platform ingesting real-time data from wearable CGM and blood-pressure monitors, cutting clinical decision-making time by 20%.
- We work across MQTT, HTTP/REST, CoAP, Modbus, OPC-UA, BLE, and Zigbee, and scope the data architecture around your device count and message frequency before writing code.
- A focused IoT platform runs $55,000-$100,000; a full multi-device-type platform with industrial integration runs $100,000-$160,000.
Trusted by
The pilot that worked with 10 devices on a desk.
Picture the version you actually want. A dispatcher watches 2,000 vehicle positions update live, not a CSV export from yesterday. A plant manager gets an alert 48 hours before a bearing fails, not a call after the line has already stopped. The device count doubled last quarter and nobody had to rebuild anything to handle it.
Now the version most teams get instead. An engineer wires up a broker and a database over a sprint to get the demo working. It holds for 10 devices on a desk. It does not survive the first real burst of traffic when 500 devices wake up on the same polling interval, or duplicate messages from a flaky cellular connection nobody scripted for.
Connected devices generate data. Most of it sits in silos, a tracker that doesn't talk to dispatch, sensors with no integration to the systems that should act on them. The value only shows up when the loop closes: device to data to decision, in time to matter.
What is IoT application development
IoT application development is building the software layer that connects physical devices, sensors, machines, vehicles, and equipment, to the systems that use their data. It covers device management (provisioning, authentication, OTA updates), the data ingestion pipeline (high-frequency time-series data at scale), the processing layer (rules, aggregations, anomaly detection), and the application layer (dashboards, alerts, and integrations with ERP, CRM, or operational systems). The hardware is the device. The software is what makes its data useful.
According to IoT Analytics, the number of connected IoT devices grew 14% year-over-year to 21.1 billion in 2025. The infrastructure to collect that data exists. For most businesses, the gap is the software layer that routes it into decisions, and the discipline to make it hold up past the pilot.
Why most IoT pilots never leave the desk
The odds today
- 21.1B
- IoT devices connected worldwide in 2025, up 14% year-over-year
- IoT Analytics, 2025
- 820K/day
- malicious IoT hacking attempts in 2025, a 46% jump year-over-year
- Zscaler ThreatLabz IoT & OT Threat Report, November 2025
- 387%
- increase in attacks targeting the energy sector's connected infrastructure
- Zscaler ThreatLabz IoT & OT Threat Report, November 2025
Most of that risk traces back to security treated as a launch-week afterthought. On October 21, 2016, the Mirai botnet, built from tens of thousands of consumer IoT devices compromised through default, never-rotated factory credentials, was used to launch a DDoS attack against Dyn, a company providing DNS infrastructure for a large share of the internet. Twitter, Netflix, Reddit, Spotify, PayPal, Amazon, and GitHub went down or degraded for hours. Peak attack traffic was reported around 1.2 Tbps, roughly double any DDoS attack on record at the time. The root cause wasn't sophisticated. It was devices shipped with credentials nobody was ever forced to change.
What you've probably already tried, and why it stalled
- The in-house "quick MQTT listener"
- An engineer wires up a broker and a database over a sprint to get the demo working. It holds for 10-50 devices on a desk. It doesn't survive burst traffic when hundreds of devices wake up on the same polling interval, or duplicate and out-of-order messages from a flaky cellular connection, because nobody designed for IoT's real failure modes until production found them.
- A software agency with a strong web portfolio and zero device experience
- They scope the dashboard beautifully and treat "connect to the hardware" as a footnote. In week six, the device firmware doesn't send what the spec assumed, or OTA updates fail silently in the field, and the project stalls at the exact boundary nobody scoped.
- Betting the whole platform on one big cloud vendor's managed IoT service
- Looked like the safe, nobody-gets-fired-for-choosing-this option. Google announced Cloud IoT Core's shutdown in August 2022 and sunset it a year later, and every customer who had built device-management logic directly against Google's proprietary APIs had to migrate a live fleet on a deadline they didn't choose.
- Bolting security on after the pilot works
- Get the data flowing first, "harden it before launch" becomes a backlog item that never gets prioritized because the demo already worked. This is the exact pattern behind Mirai: security not designed in from device one.
How we close the gap
We scope your device count, message frequency, and retention requirements in week one, before writing a line of code, and design the architecture around the failure modes that actually break IoT systems: intermittent connectivity, clock drift, duplicate messages, burst traffic. The same team that scopes your device fleet ships the pipeline. Fixed price, agreed before development starts.
A custom IoT platform pays off when devices already exist and the software layer is the gap.
Everything on the left should already be true for your project. Even one thing on the right, and an off-the-shelf IoT platform is the smarter spend right now.
A fit
01
Devices already in the field or on order, with data that needs to reach an operational system, not just a manufacturer's own portal.
02
A specific protocol, integration, or compliance requirement (Modbus, OPC-UA, HIPAA, industrial safety standards) that a generic IoT SaaS platform doesn't fit.
03
Budget for a fixed-price build from $55,000, and a decision-maker who can define the operational workflow the data needs to drive.
Not a fit
- A handful of devices where an off-the-shelf IoT platform or your hardware vendor's own portal already covers the need.
- Requirements still forming, with no device count or protocol decided yet.
- Shopping for the cheapest hourly team, not a fixed-scope partner who'll own the device-firmware boundary.
Capabilities
What we build
- 01IoT platform development
End-to-end IoT platforms connecting device hardware, data pipeline, and application layer into a single operational system, with certificate-based device authentication, message routing with quality-of-service guarantees, and time-series ingestion at scale. The architecture handles the real failure modes of IoT, intermittent connectivity, clock drift, and duplicate messages, and multi-tenant support serves multiple customers or sites.
- Built with
- AWS IoT Core or Azure IoT Hub · MQTT · InfluxDB or TimescaleDB
- 02Device management
Device registry with full lifecycle management: provisioning with unique device certificates, status monitoring of connectivity, last-seen, battery, and signal, and OTA firmware updates delivered in staged rollouts to catch regressions before they reach the full fleet. Fleet-level dashboards show health across thousands of devices with drill-down to individual telemetry, alerts fire when devices go offline or report anomalies, and decommissioning workflows revoke credentials and archive history.
- Built with
- OTA firmware updates · Certificate-based provisioning
- 03Real-time data pipelines
High-frequency ingestion pipelines designed for time-series device data, where thousands of devices reporting every 10-60 seconds create a write load transactional databases handle poorly. A message broker, queuing, and stream processing feed time-series storage where per-device aggregation queries run in milliseconds, data normalization unifies device-specific payloads into one schema, and pipelines absorb burst traffic from simultaneous wake-ups without dropping messages.
- Built with
- MQTT · Kafka or Kinesis · InfluxDB or TimescaleDB
- 04Operational dashboards and alerts
Real-time dashboards designed for the operational staff who act on device data, not executives reviewing reports: the operations manager who needs to see which units are out of threshold right now, the dispatcher watching vehicle positions update every 30 seconds, and the field engineer diagnosing a drifting sensor. Live maps, time-series trend charts, threshold alert banners, and configurable alert rules per device type, with alert routing by severity via SMS, email, or Slack, and mobile-responsive access for field teams.
- Built with
- Mapbox or Google Maps · Twilio · Slack
- 05Industrial IoT and SCADA integration
Integration between modern IoT platforms and industrial systems designed before IoT was a category: SCADA, MES, CMMS, and ERP backends. Legacy equipment speaks Modbus TCP, OPC-UA, and proprietary PLC protocols, and we translate them to MQTT or REST so data reaches your cloud platform without replacing operational hardware. Edge gateways handle local processing where connectivity is intermittent with store-and-forward sync, and predictive maintenance pipelines are designed to surface equipment anomalies before failure, not after.
- Built with
- Ignition, Wonderware, Siemens WinCC · Modbus TCP · OPC-UA · MQTT or REST
- 06Connected product development
Complete software stack for physical products that ship with connectivity as a product feature: consumer IoT devices, commercial equipment with remote monitoring, and smart building systems. A cloud backend handles device state via the shadow/twin pattern so the app always shows current state even when the device is offline, plus account and multi-device management, remote control with delivery confirmation, and firmware delivery, with iOS and Android companion apps and usage telemetry that feeds product decisions.
- Built with
- Device shadow/twin pattern · MQTT or WebSocket · iOS and Android apps
How we work
From scope to shipped
Every IoT project follows the same four phases. Scope is locked and price is fixed before development starts.
- Week 101
Discovery and scope
We map your device types, data volumes, communication protocols, and the operational workflow that needs to act on the data. You leave week 1 with a written scope document and a fixed-price quote. No development starts without your sign-off.
- Weeks 2-302
Architecture and design
Data architecture decisions made here cost ten times less than the same decisions in week 8. We design the ingestion pipeline, message broker configuration, storage schema, and dashboard wireframes before writing production code. The spec is locked before the build starts.
- Weeks 4-1203
Build, integrate, and QA
Working data flowing into a staging environment by the end of sprint one. Bi-weekly demos. QA runs in parallel with every sprint covering device connectivity edge cases, message durability under burst load, and integration correctness.
- Weeks 12+04
Launch and post-launch support
Production deployment with monitoring activated on launch day. 8 weeks of post-launch support included in every project. OTA update delivery and fleet health monitoring set up before handover.
Proof it works
We built a remote patient monitoring platform that ingests real-time data from wearable continuous glucose monitors and blood-pressure monitors, streaming it to a provider portal clinicians actually use. It cut clinical decision-making time by 20%, with 150+ patients onboarded in the first 12 weeks. Read the full case study.
What clients say
What our clients say
Three-year average engagement. Founders and operators describing the work in their own words. No marketing varnish.
Charles E.
USAEntrepreneur at Aggie Technologies
All of the sprints were completed on schedule and on budget. We highly recommend RaftLabs!
01 / 02
Why us
Why teams choose RaftLabs
- 01Senior engineers build what they scope
The engineers who assess your IoT problem also build the solution. No bait-and-switch, no offshore handoff after the contract is signed. The team you meet in week 1 ships in week 12.
- 02Fixed price before development starts
We scope the work, calculate the cost, and lock it in writing before any development starts. A scope change is a change request: priced, agreed, or dropped. It never absorbs into the project and appears on the final invoice.
- 03100+ products shipped since 2015
Clients include Vodafone, T-Mobile, Aldi, Nike, Cisco, and Lockheed Martin. Track record across connected devices, AI, SaaS, mobile, and enterprise platforms across healthcare, logistics, and manufacturing.
- 04Compliance built in from the start
GDPR, HIPAA, SOC 2, compliance requirements are scoped in week 1, not retrofitted before launch. We have shipped HIPAA-compliant connected-device systems for US healthcare clients and GDPR-compliant products for European markets.
Fair questions, straight answers
- "You'll nail the cloud and dashboard side and fumble the actual device and firmware integration."
- We work directly in MQTT, CoAP, Modbus, OPC-UA, BLE, and Zigbee, and scope the device-firmware boundary explicitly in week one, before designing a pipeline around assumptions that don't match what the firmware actually sends.
- "This will work in the demo with 10 devices and fall over at 2,000."
- We architect for burst traffic, duplicate messages, and intermittent connectivity from the start, the failure modes that only show up at real scale, not the happy path a desk demo tests.
- "We'll get locked into your architecture the same way we got locked into our last cloud vendor."
- Google shut down Cloud IoT Core about a year after announcing it, forcing every customer built against its proprietary APIs to migrate on a deadline they didn't choose. We design the device-management layer so it isn't hard-wired to one vendor's APIs.
- "Security will be an afterthought bolted on before launch."
- Certificate-based provisioning and credential lifecycle management are part of the architecture from device one, not a pre-launch checklist item.
- "You don't understand our compliance requirement."
- HIPAA for medical devices, industrial safety standards for SCADA and OT, GDPR for EU deployments, scoped in week 1 and designed in, not retrofitted.
- "The quote will balloon once you discover what our legacy PLC or SCADA system actually exposes."
- We scope the integration approach during discovery, what the existing system exposes, before pricing, specifically to avoid this.
- "We'll be stuck maintaining a data pipeline nobody on our team can operate after you leave."
- Documentation and knowledge-transfer sessions are part of every engagement, and 8 weeks of post-launch support is included so your team isn't on their own the week after go-live.
What IoT application development costs
We price by project, not by the hour. After a scoping session you get a fixed quote with a defined scope, timeline, and price, so you know the number before development starts. Where you land depends on scope, not negotiation:
- Focused IoT platform, $55,000-$100,000
- Device management for one device type, real-time data ingestion, a dashboard, and basic alerting, in 12 to 16 weeks.
- Full IoT platform, $100,000-$160,000
- Multiple device types, complex data processing, and ERP or SCADA integration.
What pushes cost up: multiple device types, industrial protocol integration, and strict compliance requirements such as HIPAA or SOC 2. What keeps it down: a single device type, managed cloud IoT services rather than self-hosted infrastructure, and a well-documented existing hardware protocol. We scope every project before pricing it.
What it costs
Starting at $55,000. Yours to run.
A defined scope, a timeline, and a price, agreed before development starts.
Starts at $55,000
Priced by project, not by the hour, after a review of your devices and data. 12-16 weeks to production, with room to add more devices once the first phase is live.
Most IoT builds start with one device type and one data pipeline, then expand once the platform is proven. The entry price you approve is the price you pay for that phase.
Ownership
You own the platform, the architecture, and the device data from day one. No proprietary framework, nothing that locks you to one cloud vendor's IoT APIs.
No hourly billing
Scope and price for each phase are locked in writing before development starts. No hourly billing, no surprise line items on the invoice.
What you actually get
The unglamorous decisions that decide whether an IoT platform survives the jump from a desk pilot to a real fleet.
- 01
The scoping questions asked before a line of code
Device count, message frequency, and retention requirements, mapped in week one, so the architecture is built for your real scale, not a guess.
- 02
An architecture built for burst traffic, not just the happy path
Designed for hundreds of devices waking up on the same polling interval, duplicate messages, and dropped connections, the failure modes a desk demo never tests.
- 03
Staged OTA rollouts, not a fleet-wide gamble
Firmware updates ship to a small ring first, catching regressions before they reach every device in the field.
- 04
A vendor-lock-in audit before we recommend a cloud IoT platform
We tell you honestly what happens if that vendor changes its roadmap, and design the device-management layer so it isn't hard-wired to one provider's proprietary APIs.
- 05
Security designed in at device one, not bolted on before launch
Certificate-based provisioning and credential lifecycle management from the first sprint, not a pre-launch checklist item.
- 06
Documentation your team can actually run
Architecture, protocols, and pipeline design documented well enough that your team can operate and extend it without calling us first.
Stay on topic
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Read moreFrequently asked questions
IoT application development is the process of building the software layer that connects physical devices, sensors, machines, vehicles, meters, and equipment, to the systems that use their data. This includes the device management platform (provisioning, authentication, OTA updates), the data ingestion pipeline (handling high-frequency time-series data at scale), the processing layer (rules, aggregations, anomaly detection), and the application layer (dashboards, alerts, and integrations with ERP, CRM, or operational systems). The hardware is your devices. The software is what makes the data from those devices useful.
We build the software layer and integrate with your hardware via its communication protocol. Common protocols we work with: MQTT (most common for IoT messaging), HTTP/REST (for devices with higher power budgets), CoAP (constrained devices), WebSockets (real-time bidirectional), Modbus and OPC-UA (industrial equipment), BLE and Zigbee (short-range sensors). We don't manufacture hardware, but we work alongside your hardware vendor to integrate their device firmware with the platform we build.
Device data is fundamentally different from transactional data, it's high frequency, time-series, and often arrives in bursts. We use message queue architectures (MQTT broker + message queue) to handle ingestion at scale without data loss, time-series databases for efficient storage and querying of sensor data, stream processing for real-time aggregations and alerting, and edge processing where bandwidth or latency constraints require processing close to the device. We scope the data architecture around your device count, message frequency, and retention requirements before writing a line of code.
Yes. Most IoT projects involve integrating device data with an existing system of record, a SCADA system, ERP, CMMS, fleet management platform, or custom operations tool. We scope the integration approach during discovery, what the existing system exposes via API or database, what data needs to flow in each direction, and where the authoritative source for each data type lives. Integration with legacy industrial systems (Modbus, OPC-UA) and modern cloud platforms (AWS IoT, Azure IoT Hub) are both in scope.
A focused IoT platform, device management for one device type, real-time data ingestion, a dashboard, and basic alerting, typically runs $55,000-$100,000. A full IoT platform with multiple device types, complex data processing, and ERP or SCADA integration runs $100,000-$160,000. Cost depends on device count, data volume, integration complexity, and application requirements. We scope every project before pricing it.
Not by default. Google shut down Cloud IoT Core in August 2023, about a year after announcing it, and every customer who had built device-management logic directly against Google's proprietary APIs had to migrate a live fleet on a deadline they didn't choose. We build on the cloud provider that fits your constraints, but we design the device-management and data-pipeline layer so it isn't hard-wired to one vendor's proprietary APIs, so a future platform decision is your call, not an emergency.
Fair question, most agencies that pitch IoT have a strong web portfolio and have never shipped against real device firmware. We work directly in MQTT, CoAP, Modbus, OPC-UA, BLE, and Zigbee, and we scope the device-firmware boundary explicitly in week one, what the firmware actually sends, what happens on a dropped connection, what a duplicate or out-of-order message looks like, before we design the pipeline around assumptions that don't match reality in the field.
Yes. We sign NDAs before any scoping conversation. IoT projects often involve proprietary device firmware, hardware designs, and industrial operational data. All project deliverables, source code, and architecture documentation are assigned to the client on final payment. RaftLabs retains no rights to your IP or your device data.
Work with us
Tell us what you need. We'll tell you what it would take.
We scope IoT Application Development Company in 30 minutes. You walk away with a clear cost, timeline, and approach. No commitment required.
- Scope and cost agreed before work starts. No surprises. No obligation.
- Working prototype within 3 weeks of kickoff.
- Pay by milestone. You see progress before each invoice.
- 60-day post-launch warranty. Bug fixes, UI tweaks, and deployment support. No retainer.
- All conversations are NDA-protected.