Note, this is an edited transcript of the opening address at Private Networks Global Forum last week. The whole event is available for registrants on-demand, for free (follow link). But this text which also forms the introduction of the summary report about the event (out next week), says something about the state-of-(connected)-things, currently, on private 4G and 5G networks, and is probably worth putting in writing online.
Welcome to Private Networks Global Forum. This is the fifth version of this event – in either its global or European format, and it feels like this technology has come a long way, and also not very far at all. It is a contradictory market, in ways – half the time you hear about how companies are growing business hand-over-fist, and half the time you hear that the market has failed to live up to expectations. But hype is an important aspect of this. Some quick numbers, to start.
The most-quoted stat about private networks, from Nokia five years ago, says the addressable market (TAM) stretches to about 14 million enterprise venues – which captures the epic sweep of the industrial sector, and explains why the market is so excitable. But a recent market review by Analysys Mason – to take just one at random – says only about 4,000 private networks have been deployed. Which is not much at all – just 0.003 percent of that speculative TAM figure.
But it is wrong to look at the market in such a limited way, of course. Every analyst house predicts strong growth over the next few years. The tales from trenches say what an exciting and powerful technology this is. German industrial giant Siemens, say, which is in no particular hurry with any of this, reckons that 5G will be in every factory, eventually – where critical connectivity is required. Does that mean 10 million factories? No. But it means a good piece of work, and a good piece of business, in lots of them.
Plus, generative AI is coming, of course – on a much steeper hype curve. And we know what they say about that, right – that gen AI needs private 5G and private 5G needs gen AI. But all of this mostly relates to manufacturing – which is the poster-child for industrial revolution, and also the most taciturn in the whole Industry 4:0 brood. It was always going to take longer. And while it kicks the tires on 5G, and waits for a better version of it, the market has been scaling systems and shrinking systems, and selling elsewhere.
Private Networks Global Forum is about private networks everywhere – in mines and ports and warehouses, and in offices and stadiums and hospitals. And in these places, private 5G is going okay. It is early-days, and it is not easy, but who ever said it was going to be easy? This event, and this report about it, considers the hype and glory which has attended the enterprise market’s first brushes with private cellular, and seeks to present the reality, both harsh and bright, of the picture they have created.
It is a fabulous agenda with fabulous speakers, featuring enterprise-led case studies and discussions, plus an exclusive gallery of higher-ups from the selling side, talking about network design, network scaling, network testing, network spectrum, and all the industrial AI pyrotechnics you can shake a 5G stick at. The story they tell says that, despite all the impatience that the market goes faster, very real progress is being made – and that there is a ready glut of experience about what to watch-for and how to make it work.
In the end, what this event and this document offers is a shared experience, and shared ideas about ways to go forward. Because, like we all know, private networks – or IoT, or Industry 4.0, or digital change, or whatever – is a team sport and a long game. It’s not easy, but nothing worth doing is easy. Equally, the collected stories from Private Networks Global Forum suggest the road is always getting easier, faster, better – and that, even with 0.003 percent of the journey done, industrial revolution is just over the rise.
Finally, to roll the credits…. RCR Wireless would like to thank Druid Software, Future Technologies, iBwave, and Spirent as sponsors of Private Networks Global Forum. Without them, events like this do not happen, and the experience is less shared, and the market is less buzzy. So long as the marketing hype gets commercial focus – through events like this, supported by companies like this – then the ecosystem gets busy and the journey gets productive, and the final destination is not a yardstick to be beaten with.
