As enterprises scale digitalisation, multi-site private 5G deployments offer seamless connectivity, centralised management, and consistent security across facilities, writes Matt Addicks, Ericsson Enterprise Wireless Solutions.
Finding technology that perfectly fits a need for your business is like finding a gold mine. Productivity goes up, siloes go down, and experiences improve for both clients and employees. Certain businesses are finding advantages with private 5G. A growing number of enterprises are leveraging full-fledged private 5G deployments that offer dedicated bandwidth for their most critical operations. When businesses – such as warehouses and logistic centres – implement these deployments, systems remain online, deadlines are met, and clients remain satisfied.
As the enterprises enjoy the benefits of private 5G – it’s natural to wonder how to bring these advantages to all business sites. In other words, enterprise leaders may ask themselves, “As we scale our digitalisation efforts, how do we scale private 5G, the foundational technology enabling those efforts?” While organisations explore how to scale their networks, they may find their best option lies in finding a private 5G network that can be deployed at multiple sites – whether locally within the same city or nationally across cities.
Private 5G isn’t just for your flagship facility anymore
Traditionally, when an enterprise wanted to leverage a private 5G (or LTE) network at multiple sites, they may have had to deploy an end-to-end solution at every location. This includes a cellular core including the network controller — also known as the brains of the network — along with the various components of the radio access network (RAN) such as basebands, radios, and antennas.
A multi-site private network approach is one in which the top tier/flagship facility is where some network assets are centralised – such as the cellular core and network controller. The enterprise then only needs to deploy the RAN at any smaller distributed sites where coverage or mobility are the main problems to solve for, not real-time applications where every millisecond is critical.
Realising the benefits of Private 5G at every site
This ability to scale private cellular coverage without deploying multiple end-to-end networks comes with several advantages for the enterprise. First, it allows enterprises to leverage the coverage and seamless mobility of private 5G while decreasing the total cost of ownership associated with multiple end-to-end networks.
In addition, it can remove some of the technical, resource, and security complexities associated with managing multiple end-to-end private network deployments. Comprehensive distributed deployments allow network management for each site from a single dashboard and ensure SIMs are authenticated across all sites.
Disparate networks can create inconsistent security policies as staff, devices, and connected machinery move between sites. With a multi-site approach, network administrators can authorise one SIM for multiple sites, which allows security policies to remain intact, without having to place new SIMs in each device every time that device enters a new site. This streamlines the deployment and management of networks in a multi-site deployment.
How will I know if I need a multi-site deployment?
Analysing potential use cases and current real-world benefits is the best way to determine if a distributed private 5G deployment is necessary. For example, logistics is one industry in which multi-site private network deployments present multiple advantages. In the era of Industry 4.0, enterprises are heavily dependent on AI, robotics and other automated technology that must have reliable, flexible, and scalable connectivity.
Currently, warehouse operators are working to bridge the gap between information technology, IT, and operations technology OT. Usually, IT includes functions such as network security while OT includes the automation and robotics responsible for moving, managing, picking, placing and packing stock. These two functions come together for certain systems in an Industry 4.0 enabled facility. For example, automated mobile robots (AMRs) or automated guided vehicles (AGVs) must be able to move from site to site, maintaining reliable connectivity with consistent security policies.
The logistics industry is already presenting real world scenarios for how private 5G can allow seamless, scalable connectivity. A warehouse operator for example can build a new production facility across the street from its main hub and connect that facility to existing IT infrastructure, or do the same across multiple warehouses on a single site or within a campus precinct. A multi-site private 5G approach allows them to extend high-speed 5G to the new site while allowing one network administrator to easily manage the network. Multi-site can also extend across borders, allowing the same network administrator to maintain network compliance at their facilities in different cities thanks to a multi-site private 5G deployment.
While logistics is just one example of an industry seeing benefits, network administrators and IT leaders from various industries can look at current deployments and see how these advantages apply to their business needs. A multi-site deployment is likely beneficial for enterprises looking to scale their private 5G network across sites, maintain centralised network management, seamless deploy consistent security policies, and create a network flexibility for future technology (such as automated robots and vehicles) that may move across multiple locations. Armed with this type of scalability and flexibility in deploying private 5G, enterprises can approach innovation with definitive agility and confidence.
