Routers and gateway play an integral role in IoT development. The functionality provided by an edge router allows for enterprise-level of security, routing, resiliency, and quality of service. The gateway plays an important role in translating non-IP networks into the IP-based protocols necessary for internet and cloud connectivity. It is also important to realize that the growth of IoT to billions of nodes will take shape with low cost and constrained electronics. Features such as enterprise routing, tunneling, and VPNs require significant hardware and processing capabilities, and it makes sense to use routers and gateways for that service function. Later in this book, we will also look at how edge routers play a vital role in edge processing and fog computing.  

The next chapter will go deep into IoT-based protocols such as MQTT and CoAP, with working examples. These protocols are the lightweight language of IoT and more often than not use gateways and edge routers as translators.