After several years of chasing the opportunity to offer private cellular networks to businesses and public sector organizations, mobile operators are reporting positive traction, says GlobalData. In its 2022 Global ICT Investment Survey, the leading data and analytics company found that 82% of the 1,400 enterprises surveyed are planning to add private cellular networks to their budgets. For example, Vodafone notes that it has 30-40 live deployments now with over 100 more in its sales pipeline, while Verizon has disclosed 10 private network deployments over the last 12 months.
Kathryn Weldon, Principal Analyst at GlobalData, at GlobalData, comments: “Private cellular networks offer dedicated connectivity, security, and data privacy, combined with the flexibility, high bandwidth, and low latency of cellular technology. This can support advanced use cases such as real-time data collection and analysis, robotics control and augmented reality for remote control of machines or employee training, generally within geographically constrained environments such as inside of buildings or campuses.”
According to GlobalData’s report, ‘Private 4G/5G Network Services Competitive Landscape Assessment’, many operators offer dedicated and hybrid private/public 4G and 5G connectivity, multiple service tiers for different segments, advisory and professional services, edge and application enablement, and leverage a wealth of ecosystem partners. They also tout a growing number of trials and commercial customers, as well as healthy pipelines in industrial verticals such as utilities, mining, manufacturing, and transportation, as well as for healthcare, educational and R&D campuses.
While mobile operators such as AT&T, Verizon, Deutsche Telekom, and Vodafone acknowledge that they may be competing as well as partnering with telecom infrastructure providers and Systems Integrators for private cellular deals, they are upbeat about their central role in this market and anticipate success.
Weldon adds: “Leading mobile operators are gaining new customers from private networks and anticipate substantial future revenues for connectivity, as well as value-added services such as design, testing, Proof of Concept, integration, application enablement, edge computing, and ongoing management. Private networks are also key to the growth of next generation Internet of Things (IoT) services. These networks are also a primary enterprise use case for 5G, although approximately 80% of deployments so far are still using 4G LTE.”
