Verizon Business, the international enterprise sales division of US carrier Verizon, has deployed an Ericsson-made private 5G and neutral host system for US engine manufacturer Cummins at its two-million square-foot production facility in Lakewood, west of Jamestown, in Chautauqua County in New York. The all-edge private network, for critical Industry 4.0 cases, utilises local tranches of Verizon’s C-band spectrum, with around 160 MHz available for 5G and about 40 MHz for 4G/LTE traffic, it said. It comprises 125 hardware radio “resources”, including six outdoor radios.
Verizon is the anchor carrier for the neutral host network, too – and technical lead for network implementation, covering design, procurement, and installation. The likes of AT&T and T-Mobile are able to set-up on the neutral host system (if they choose), which is designed to provide higher-quality public 5G coverage to workers at Cummins’ Jamestown Engine Plant. Around 1,500 staff are employed at the site, which produces around 500 heavy-duty truck engines per day. The firm is the first customer to take Verizon Business’ “all-new neutral host network product”.
Both networks are under construction now. Ericsson is the sole vendor on the project. Verizon Business said: “The deal combines a neutral host network [and a] private 5G network to cover distinct public-network and private-network use cases… Cummins can use the neutral host network for connecting phones and tablets to the public networks of all major US carriers who opt-in to joining the neutral host network, and the private 5G network on Verizon licensed spectrum for business-critical applications that require enhanced onsite security or capability.”
Verizon cited various use cases for the private 5G network, including industrial vehicles and robots (AGVs, AMRs, MIRs) for handling and transporting materials, plus AR/VR for remote worker assistance and collaboration, production-line machine vision for defect detection, sundry sensors for machine health monitoring, and other proprietary applications for “secure onsite operations”. Verizon Business said the decision to upgrade to private cellular, in particular, was precipitated by its move to introduce two new production lines next year (2025).
“That’s the compelling event,” said Jennifer Artley, in charge of ‘5G acceleration’ at Verizon Business. “Cummins wants to drive significant efficiencies and sustainability with these new lines. But it has four challenges: [public network] coverage in the plant is inconsistent, making the experience for employees inconsistent; the cost to lay new cable to the new equipment and sensors is extremely expensive; the Wi-Fi coverage is insufficient to support mobile robots and barcode scanners; and its push-to-talk devices and Land Mobile Radio network are end-of-life.”
Ericsson is the company’s only radio partner to support Verizon’s licensed bands in the US – whether for public or private cellular services. Cummins wanted an ultra-reliable all-edge private 5G system on its premises, and the conclusion was that CBRS would not cut it, said Verizon Business. “CBRS is not as reliable, secure, or available, and doesn’t provide a true voice alternative for something of that size – a million square feet indoors, a million square feet outdoors. Whereas licensed spectrum gives the security, reliability, capacity, control, and flexibility to add more,” said Eric McClanahan, director of solutions architecture in the same unit at Verizon Business.
Verizon Business introduced a neutral host offer in March. It said the deployment at the Jamestown Engine Plant allows it to “validate private cellular for additional sites in the future”. Artley added: “All the connectivity bases are covered with this solution, and the efficient architecture makes it cost-effective, easy to maintain, and easy to add onto as operations grow and evolve. Cummins said, which produces diesel, natural gas, electric, and hybrid powertrains, said the “near-term” objective is to “accelerate Industry 4.0 use cases” at the
Shawn Hricko, plant manager for Cummins at the Jamestown Engine Plant, said: “These increased capabilities will allow us to implement Industry 4.0 strategies more quickly and more reliably. The improved functionality will enable team members to communicate with one another more effectively, allow us to share more data across equipment and enable our ability to implement mobile industrial robots (MIRs). Collectively, these improvements will enable us to produce our engines more safely, more efficiently, and with improved quality.”
Ron Fleetwood, executive director of IT business services at Cummins, said: “The deployment of a private 5G network at our Jamestown facility is very exciting as we evaluate new digital capabilities that will transform our manufacturing operations and help to create a world class workplace for our employees. This is another milestone in our digital manufacturing journey that allows us to validate private cellular for additional sites in the future and to accelerate i4.0 use cases for Jamestown in the near term.”
A full interview with Jennifer Artley from Verizon Business will follow this week.
