More, here, from Ericsson about private 5G, after the Swedish vendor replied formally to questions in email from RCR Wireless about its enterprise strategy; its responses arrived after Monday’s post on the subject, and go further in terms of the trends it sees in the market. These can be broadly summed up as follows: that private 5G sales are “growing strongly”, as per its financial results (see last post), and deployments are scaling well, both vertically between industrial sectors, and horizontally across sites, workloads, and applications.
The firm signed 20 “global enterprise logos” for the supply of private 4G/5G networks in the second quarter. Beyond that, it says it sees limited value in reporting deployment volumes on the grounds that it is connecting small sites to the cloud and big sites at the edge, and vice versa, and that numbers might therefore be misconstrued. Manish Tiwari, head of private networks, writes: “The private network is an enterprise wireless network and needs to support enterprise devices moving across multiple locations as a single enterprise network instance.”
The point is the discipline is less about networks, of whatever kind, and more about connectivity, wherever and however it is required. Which is correct, clearly – even if everyone wants to know the numbers. More interesting, perhaps, although self-evident as well, is the clarity on its go-to-market strategy. Ericsson once said, some years back, that it will defer to its traditional carrier (CSP) partners for the sale of private networks. It was striking at the time because Nokia said the opposite – that it would work the most appropriate channels to get its systems to market.
Tiwari flags the importance of network operators as its regular channel, but also points to a bunch of integrator and reseller partners – which is the same story its roster of private-network contracts tells. He says: “We won over 20 global enterprise logos in Q2 via our multi-channel go-to-market structure. Each… typically has a land-and-expand buyer journey as enterprises start realising the ROI [from] initial deployments. We sell through several tier-one CSPs globally as well as through [a] global two-tier IT distribution channel… We also partner with GSIs and vertical SIs.”
The ‘land-and-expand’ line is probably standard sales talk, but it is familiar from discussions with Verizon Business, among Ericsson’s “tier-one” partners, about how to pitch private 5G. Elsewhere, Tiwari brushes off market chatter about an exec-level exodus from Cradlepoint, its US private networks business, and presents it instead as a newly-integrated part of an acquisitive enterprise 5G unit within Ericsson. “The total headcount [at Cradlepoint] has more than doubled… and continues to grow,” he responds.
The final point, talked about in the op/ed intro to the last enterprise newsletter from RCR Wireless (see July 18), is that Ericsson is looking to make its private 5G offering part of a more comprehensive connectivity offering for enterprises, which covers software-defined wide-area networking (SWAN) and public 5G slicing, as well as neutral host infrastructure and services, and wireless network security package. Perhaps this hints at the scheduled reveal for September (see last post). Questions remain about whether it will curate computing and applications, alongside.
But it sounds like something is cooking, at least. The full Q&A with Tiwari is included below; all the responses are from him. More detailed coverage will come in September, if not before.
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– Can Ericsson add some detail and colour about the performance of its private networks business (Ericsson / Cradlepoint) in the quarter, and generally?
“Our private networks business is growing strongly in 2024 due to accelerating customer adoption of our technology in several target verticals. Customers who were exploring private networks through POCs 2-3 years ago started deploying in production last year and are now starting to deploy at scale across multiple facilities, globally.”
– Can you say how many private 4G/5G networks Ericsson deployed in the period, and how many it has deployed in total?
“We don’t report the number of 4G/5G networks deployed, and don’t focus on the number of locations as a business metric for our private networks business. Depending on the enterprise use case, an enterprise can have many small locations which can be served via a distributed deployment that can be supported via remote functions in a datacenter, or an enterprise may have a fully isolated large private network that needs to function standalone even if the WAN connectivity is unavailable. Our view is that the private network is an enterprise wireless network and needs to support enterprise devices moving across multiple locations as a single enterprise network instance.”
– Can you say how many private 4G/5G networks Ericsson sold in the quarter (and has deployed in total) via various channels: MNOs, GSIs / local SIs, direct sales, others
“We successfully won over 20 global enterprise logos in Q2 via our multi-channel GTM structure. Each of these new deployments typically has a land and expand buyer journey as enterprises start realizing the ROI of their initial deployments. We sell through several Tier-1 CSPs globally as well as through our global two-tier IT distribution channel program. We also partner with leading GSIs and vertical Sis to support select sales motions in the market.”
– Can you say the total Cradlepoint headcount now – versus when Cradlepoint was acquired?
“Ericsson had created a new business unit focused on Enterprise Networking and Security in 2022 by combining Cradlepoint and Dedicated Networks unit from Ericsson emerging technologies area. Further, Cradlepoint has also done M&A and acquired companies to expand its offerings since its acquisition in 2020. The total headcount has more than doubled as a result and continues to grow as the business scales further.”
– Can you respond to claims that a part of the senior management at Cradlepoint has been let go, in some fashion?
“This is not accurate. Three years after the acquisition, we have had a few executives voluntarily decide to retire. We still have a strong set of leaders from Cradlepoint and new leaders that are prepared to support the growth of our business.”
– Can you comment on the state of the private 4G/5G market, currently – in terms of demand, deployments, industries, applications etc?
“The private networks market is starting to accelerate in 2024. A significantly higher number of enterprises are looking to deploy this technology to improve their productivity and enable positive business outcomes. For most enterprises in our target verticals, there seems to be a better understanding of what private 5G can do for their operations and how it differs from legacy wireless technologies. These customers test for specific functionality in POCs based on this understanding and make informed decisions on which vendor to select based on network performance, latency and mobility requirements.”
– Can you expand on Ericsson’s private 5G strategy – how it is developing in terms of products and services
“Ericsson’s private 5G strategy is a cohesive component of our Enterprise 5G strategy where we believe that we can enable enterprises to break barriers with innovative wireless solutions and liberate industries, businesses and public sector to operate, grow and innovate without constraints. We are progressing on this strategy by scaling, integrating and unifying our GTM structure globally across different product lines and building technology that enables enterprises to use our technologies across WWAN, Security, Private Networks and Neutral Host in a better together way and simplifies an enterprise customers journey from a single use case to adopting our portfolio and complete enterprise 5G platform.”
