Private Network Market by LTE, 5G and Edge Computing in Enterprise, Industrial, and Government Solutions 2022 - 2027

This report evaluates the private network market including the use of 5G new radio solutions. It also analyzes the market for MNO and VNO to offer private IoT networks for the benefit of industrial automation and mission-critical enterprise applications and services. The report evaluates major players, technologies, and solutions.

The report also assesses market challenges, opportunities, and the overall outlook for 5G NR equipment and components. The report provides detailed forecasts for equipment globally and regionally as well as investment in 5G NR by industry vertical.

Select Report Findings:

• The carrier-provided 5G indoor market will reach $2.9B globally by 2027, growing at 47.2% CAGR
• The highest ROI solutions for carrier LTE-A and 5GNR offerings will be for enterprise applications and industrial automation
• Growth of private LTE and 5G solutions for enterprise and industrial customers is 37% faster than public apps and services
• 5GNR solutions will be largely fixed wireless WAN connectivity and support of industrial private communications networks
• Solutions will consist of Fully Virtualized, Dedicated/Non-Virtualized, and Hybrid Network Solutions for business customers
• Carriers will move ahead aggressively with non-standalone 5G but will realize significant benefits with 5G core network upgrades
• 5G wireless deployment in indoor environments within smart cities and suburbs will exceed the total of all exurban and rural areas combined globally
• The global 5G fixed wireless transport to smart buildings for specifically for support of WiFi connectivity/backhaul will reach $459.3M by 2027
• 5G subscription within public networks will exceed private through 2027, although the latter will experience a 20% faster growth rate, set to overtake the former by 2030

LTE Advanced (LTE-A) represents a major step in the evolution of 4G technology, providing mobile coverage, higher performance, and greater connection stability. The 5G New Radio (NR) access technology is a part of 5G Radio Access Network (RAN) architecture that is composed of LTE evolution and millimeter wave (mmWave) technology that will be operable from sub-1 GHz to 24+ GHz in a range of the low band, mid-band, and high band.

A variety of complementary technologies will enable 5G NR supported systems including massive MIMO, advanced LPDC, TDD subframe, beamforming, and mmWave radiofrequency.

For communication service providers, mmWave will bring both challenges and opportunities for general RAN infrastructure and in particular for the private Internet of Things (IoT) networks for industrial automation and mission-critical services for enterprises across many industry verticals.

The higher frequencies suffer from attenuation, which means they lose signal over distance and when they hit objects (even water vapor, but especially solid objects like trees, buildings, etc.). This is why there is a need for massive MIMO and other multi-signal approaches to help, along with beam-forming to direct RF energy to where it is needed, but the signal is so directional in nature that it is very hard to maintain with a moving object.

From an infrastructure and managed services perspective, 5G NR will facilitate vertical market opportunities for vendors to offer distributed macro-cell base stations, small cells units, remote radio head units, and C-RAN baseband units for both dedicated and shared resource networks. 5G RRHs unit shipment alone will grow at over 72% CAGR and will exceed 169M units by 2027.

Enterprise and industrial segments will continue to deploy private networks utilizing LTE and WiFi. Many of these networks will evolve to 5G and include edge computing to maximize overall throughput and minimize latency, which will be crucial for certain critical communications solutions such as industrial process automation.

Enterprise and industrial customers may choose a combination of communications and computing as a service from carriers or purchase infrastructure that is managed by a third-party entity. Examples of some recent carrier-supported private wireless deployments include the following:

Verizon: The company recently partnered with U.K. port operator Associated British Ports to provide the Port of Southampton with a private 5G wireless network. The port of Southampton is a part of a large supply chain, accounting for £40 billion in U.K. exports yearly. Southampton also serves as the country’s largest port for cars (nearly 900,000/year) and cruise liners. The network runs on the Nokia Digital Automation Cloud, which offers edge computing capabilities.

AT&T: The company established a public/private partnership with Chicago’s MxD (Manufacturing x Digital), has created a 5G private network with funding from the Department of Defense and other private members. The wireless network is meant to help companies learn how to improve their manufacturing operations through 5G networks. The MxD private network uses only two radios, one with mmWave 5G and the other with sub-6 5G that connects to AT&T’s central network core.

Carrier-supported private LTE and 5G networks will consist of Virtualized Network Solutions, Dedicated/Non-Virtualized Network Solutions, and Hybrid Network Solutions with an anticipated global market opportunity of $12.6, $9.2B, and $17.1B respectively.

Private wireless deployments will differ greatly based on whether they conform to a carrier-owned/controlled model or to one based on enterprise/industrial ownership and control. In the case of the former, the carrier will be required to provision and administer apps and/or allow access by third parties, such as Over-the-Top (OTT) service providers. In the case of the latter, the enterprise or industrial customer will manage their own apps, or more likely, hire their own third-party team to manage on their behalf.

While some business customers will vie for virtualized instances of carrier infrastructure/platforms, other enterprise, industrial, and government customers will go with private networks within their own control and/or facilities. In other words, some of these private networks are going to be in competition with carrier communication services as the likes of Nokia are actually competing with their own customers (e.g. carriers are customers of infrastructure providers like Nokia, Ericsson, etc.).

While many of these changes in public versus private networks currently impact the radio access network and edge computing alone (e.g. businesses still need connectivity with carriers for WAN communications), it sets the stage for potential evolution towards a more distributed service realization environment that may involve a more dispersed core network that is not completely owned/controlled by the legacy carriers.

With private network subscriptions set to overtake public networks by 2030, carriers are highly advised to spend most of their efforts on solutions for business customers (e.g. enterprise, industrial, and government clients). This is advised even if it means losing some of their communications business due to private wireless deployment in which the business customer owns and operates a portion of their own internal network.

Leveraging unique 5G capabilities will be extremely important. For example, leading communication service providers will take an end-to-end approach to 5G network slicing that leverages disaggregation and virtualization of both radio and core network elements.

In the core network, NFV and SDN capabilities are leveraged to meet QoS/QoE requirements, whereas in the radio network separation of radio access network (RAN) elements by real-time vs. static functions is important to 5G network slicing.

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