First and foremost, says the Managing Director at nexGworx, enterprises want their unique challenges to be understood
While private 5G networks are widely viewed as the next big revenue driver for operators and other industry players, questions remain around whether the intended customers — enterprises of all sizes, that is — have fully bought in yet. To understand what it is that enterprises really want from their connectivity providers, RCR Wireless News invited the Managing Director at nexGworx Ste Ashton and Verizon’s GM and Head of EMEA Sanjiv Gossain to speak at RCR Live Telco Reinvention in London to share their insights.
First and foremost, shared Ashton, enterprises want their unique challenges to be understood, and some may even want help identifying those challenges. “Because there’s a lot of unknowns… and assumed truths,” he said of how to best connect enterprise spaces. He added that most enterprises also want to implement data-driven decision-making processes, rather than capturing a ton of data they don’t know what to do with or don’t have time or a sufficient method of analyzing.
Also important for enterprises, continued Ashton, is the replacement of wires. “It’s that flexible shop floor,” he said. “As manufacturing processes change, as demands change, as we see supply chain issues kicking in and stopping things in the factory, you’re needing to change your plans and your layer on a fairly regular basis.” The increased need to adapt means enterprises want more flexibility and more mobility, which the higher reliability of a dedicated 5G wireless network can provide.
Finally, health and safety of workers, as well as hitting sustainability goals, are also on the top of the list of enterprise priorities, according to Ashton.
Both panelists agreed that advanced tools like 5G, artificial intelligence machine learning and edge computing can go a long way in addressing all of these challenges; however, there still exists some trepidation around jumping into implanting something like a private cellular network, due in part to the fact that these networks can be set up in a variety of ways with different partnership structures.
“[Enterprises] feel fearful that they don’t fully understand what a partnership might be getting them into,” said Ashton. “In the past people have felt oversold to and again we get back to [the] hype… Nobody has earned the right to play, I don’t think, in this space yet. I think you’ve got to be prepared to listen as you move.”
Verizon is, of course, looking to earn this “right to play,” and according Gossain, it’s doing that by yes, listening to the customer and even inviting them into their 5G labs to co-create solutions, but also simply demonstrating that the technology works by openly discussing the real-world examples.
He acknowledged that 5G was perhaps overhyped in the beginning, but says now that there are enough real-world, present-day examples of cellular technology delivering huge benefits to enterprises of all kinds to make a real case of deploying a private network. “[If] there’s a proof of technology, then there’s a proof of value,” he said. “Because once you show them… what’s possible and give examples firsthand, then their eyes, their ideas open up… We try and bring some examples of other companies that have done that in the same vertical… It’s trying to bring those industry examples and not to talk about 5G or the technology, but talk about, ‘what is the efficiency? What is the top line improvement potential?’”
One such real-world example is the port of Southampton in the U.K., which is 210-acre site housing seven-story parking garages, 45 terminals and four cruise ship berths. Here, Verizon implemented a private 5G network that supports several cameras that track delivery vehicles as they enter and exit the site. This allows the port to manage and monitor their assets as a first case. Then, he continued, they will be able to start taking advantage of their in-built infrastructure that they’ve already invested in to stack additional use cases. And this ability to “stack” use cases, according to Ashton, is key for enterprises feeling that they are getting the most from their investment.
Even as connectivity providers and partners like Verizon work to improve how they communicate the benefits of private networks and all of the other tools that come along with them, other obstacles like a still nascent device ecosystem remain. Gossain referenced a particular customer, for instance, who cannot find the 5G cameras they want simply because they don’t yet exist, and this means a delay in infrastructure deployment.
“It’s definitely been a barrier and project managers would still say it’s definitely not come off risk logs,” agreed Ashton, adding, however, that the devices will come and appear already to be coming with increasing speed. “The tap is definitely not dripping anymore; it’s starting to flow,” he said.
Ultimately, though, understanding what an enterprise wants from their network isn’t very complicated: “They don’t actually care about the ‘G’ as long as it works. So, in the interim, if you need to put in the last leg over Wi-Fi or the last leg over… one of the other basic wireless standards, they’re happy [with] that if it works,” said Ashton, suggesting that 5G networks in enterprises will come, but it may be only a small piece of the overall network for some time.
