The great promise of private cellular is that some day every enterprise will be able to have its own 4G or 5G network. There is a long way to go to reduce and simplify the offer for the mass market, but there is fantastic momentum among early adopters in a whole range of industrial sectors. These include manufacturing, logistics, education, and healthcare, plus more remote industries like agriculture, utilities, oil and gas, and mining. In the end, hardly any part of the global economy will not be connected to a combination of private and public network infrastructure.
But that is the key: that the global economy will make use of both private and public networks, and frequently their assets will roam between. Because, while many IoT devices will remain on-premise for all of their working lives, many others will move freely in and out of enterprise venues, leaving their local private network boundaries to roam onto carrier-owned public networks – and eventually back again. Which presents a technical challenge: how to ensure seamless mobility across both private and public infrastructure without compromising network performance.
Carrier services company and mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) Syniverse has the answer. Syniverse provides a global IoT SIM that works in 200-plus markets, and a hybrid network mechanic that enables an IoT device, registered originally on a private enterprise network, to attach to its carrier partners when it leaves the enterprise premises. This eliminates the need for enterprises to strike roaming agreements with multiple public carriers, in order to ensure continuity of service outside of their private enterprise networks.
Crucially, the same solution also enables the device to scan for its home network when it comes back in range. Meanwhile, Syniverse’s IoT management platform lets enterprises select the appropriate performance criteria across both types of access network – around coverage, latency, and cost, including in macro networks. The point is to reduce complexity completely from private network deployments. A single IoT eSIM, from a single provider, can connect an enterprise’s assets across their private island networks, and into the global distribution network.
Kathiravan Kandasamy, vice president of product management at Syniverse, says: “Syniverse’s role to reduce complexity in private networks is twofold. We provide [global] connectivity and… interoperability between public and private networks. We also play a role in the technology stack of private network deployment. We can partner with mobile operators, system integrators, as well as cloud service providers. [We bring] interoperability for IoT devices to not only work inside a private network but also to have continued connectivity… [on an] operator’s carrier network.”
