Verizon Business and Corning announced they have begun commercial installations of in-building 5G millimeter-wave cell sites for enterprise customers.
The partners said that the launch follows successful trialing of the solution in September.
Initial deployments of these in-building cell sites are happening in Verizon retail store locations and are also set to be installed at WeWork locations across the U.S.
?We have quickly moved from proof of concept to commercial availability and now scalability for our enterprise customers,” said Tami Erwin, CEO of Verizon Business. “The unprecedented performance of 5G Ultra Wideband is not just an investment for growth, it is a critical step in our customers’ digital transformation.?
Verizon also said that WeWork is one of the first companies in the world to have signed a contract with Verizon Business to provide Corning?s indoor 5G cells, with ten WeWork locations across the U.S. set to receive installations.
?As the last several months have shown, the demand for flexible space solutions, accompanied with the ability to connect to reliable, fast networks, has never been more valuable. That is why WeWork, a leader in flexible space, is partnering with companies like Verizon, to elevate the quality of business solutions available to members in our spaces so that they are able to run and grow their business??, said Hamid Hashemi, chief product and experience officer at WeWork.
Corning?s indoor cell site is designed to provide Verizon?s 5G mmWave service inside facilities such as hospitals, manufacturing facilities, warehouses, schools, ports, commercial office space, retail stores and any indoor environment where large amounts of data traffic must be managed and optimized.
?In order to move the cloud into an organization?s facility, they must first have access to the fastest 5G in the marketplace,? said Erwin. ?By combining access to our 5G Ultra Wideband indoors, with a private MEC platform to bring the power of the cloud into a business? facility, and a private core that helps to run the operations of the Network, an enterprise will be able to have a secure, ultra-reliable, high-speed, low-latency private 5G solution.?
Having all three components (5G Ultra Wideband indoors, private MEC, private network core) of the Private 5G network in a single facility will increase speed and efficiency by eliminating the need for data to cross through multiple routers and across large geographies, Verizon said. It will also eliminate the need to share core resources with the macro network and offer the flexibility to develop specific capabilities customized to the private network owner, the carrier added.
Corning’s indoor 5G solution, part of Corning’s portfolio of indoor cellular solutions for the enterprise, features a fully integrated baseband unit, radios and antennas in a sleek package.
“Corning is pleased to see our 5G mmWave indoor cell sites play a critical role in Verizon?s 5G Ultra Wideband network — bringing high-speed, low-latency network capabilities to Verizon’s enterprise customers,” said Michael O?Day, vice president, Corning Optical Communications. “Enterprises need a cost-effective way to unlock the opportunities of indoor 5G, and Corning’s easy-to-install solution is designed to meet that need.?
