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Unusual and inspiring private 5G stories
24 Plays2 months ago
5G isn’t just powering smartphones — it’s transforming the most unexpected places on Earth. Unusual and Inspiring Private 5G Stories takes you behind the scenes of bold and unusual deployments that defy convention. Discover how innovators are connecting vineyards, theme parks, stadiums, factories, and cities in ways no one imagined. Huge deployments. Real conversations. Real robots. Real impact. Real 5G stories that will change how you see connectivity.
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Transcript
Introduction to Unusual Private 5G Stories
00:00:01
Pablo Tomasi
So welcome back to the Telco Drift ah For those that haven't met yet, I'm Pablo Tomasi, sort of independent analyst covering different parts of the tech world. So in today's episode's unusual private 5G stories, we will ah discuss how private 5G has been used in vineyards, theme parks,
00:00:22
Pablo Tomasi
for utilities, we're going to look at hybrid network, hybrid monster, slicings, very slasher, Halloween-themed type of episode. And of course, we're going to be looking at fully dedicated networks.
00:00:32
Pablo Tomasi
Now, for each of these deployments, which I hope are deployments that most cases you're unfamiliar with or that you're possibly seeing them in a different lights, I will try to draw some conclusions, some lessons that can be replicated.
Size Matter From Public Safety To Utilities
00:00:47
Pablo Tomasi
first network that i want to highlight the first deployment it's ah It's a deployment that is getting a little bit of a bad rep you want. It's a deployment that doesn't get a lot of love.
00:00:58
Pablo Tomasi
ah And this is AT&T FirstNet. Now, why why am highlighting here? this is a deployment that a lot of people are familiar with, but again, doesn't get enough love because this is the effectively the largest hybrid network deployment in the world.
00:01:14
Pablo Tomasi
arguably so FirstNet has its own core is using dedicated spectrum band 14 to 700 megahertz and it's a very large LTE network for public safety so this is one of the the first ones that i want to make about about FirstNet LTE has been ah an extremely relevant solution for private networks and it still is so quite important to to understand that not everything has be 5G Having said that, of course, in 2024, FirstNet announced an 8 billion investment to bring 5G to the network.
00:01:49
Pablo Tomasi
That will include 5G core, of course, 1,000 new sites, and fleet of deployable assets. So you need, of course, to eventually move into 5G.
00:02:01
Pablo Tomasi
But I think my point stands. LTE has been a great technology for many years, and many private networks still use it. 5G of course is the future and then 6G and 7G blah blah blah but ah interesting to see how LTE has been like a cornerstone of critical network for so many years now we move now from the US to China and this is a different beast so we're talking about network sizing here so StateGrid, China Unicorn, Huawei and TdTech deploy a sizing solution in the Shandong province and
00:02:36
Pablo Tomasi
And again, we are talking size here. again This is probably one of the largest network slicing deployments that I can think of. And this is used end-to-end deterministic slicing also REDCap. I'm not going to focus a lot on the REDCap side of things.
00:02:50
Pablo Tomasi
But to give an idea, we're talking about 30,000 5G base station deployed and 100,000 5G connection. and a hundred thousand touch connection So again, for these first two examples, we are talking about scale. We're talking about size. That's why they are interesting. You know you want to have some some something big that you can say, wow, this is impressive.
00:03:09
Pablo Tomasi
But the other interesting thing about this deployment is that the applications that are supported are on-grid control for distributed ah ah power distribution automation, precise load control, power consumption and collection.
00:03:24
Pablo Tomasi
So these are very specific vertical applications. And this is critical ah to understand in this market Each vertical is going to have very specific applications and you need to be able to support them to really be successful.
Connectivity Challenges and Innovations in Mining
00:03:39
Pablo Tomasi
Now, moving again, sort of back in North America. And now we're talking about a fully private network. So this is Agnico Eagle Mining the Tour Lake Mining North in northern Ontario.
00:03:52
Pablo Tomasi
So this is the deployment that sees Rogers Business, Cradlepoint Dell Technology, Ericsson and Expeto as the partners involved. Why this interesting? There are a lot of mining examples.
00:04:03
Pablo Tomasi
We know mining and energy generation in general is one of the more advanced verticals for private networks. So private network here is deployed across 80 square kilometers operation and it includes 5-cellular tower and a bunch of different frequencies.
00:04:20
Pablo Tomasi
Now what is really interesting to me is that besides covering the mine, so the the network has been has been brought to also cover the highway, Highway 652 between Detour Lake and Cochrane in Ontario.
00:04:36
Pablo Tomasi
ah you know helping closing the connectivity gap. So it's interesting because you can see the B2B and the B2C side sort of kind of working together for for a project, getting synergies out of the project.
00:04:50
Pablo Tomasi
So that's the first thing that was interesting. The second interesting thing is that when you look at the press release, ah you see that the network has a fully redundant fiber optic backbones, microwave link backup, and is using satellite phones and copper lines as emergency backup.
00:05:06
Pablo Tomasi
So once again, the idea that some people had that you're just going to have prior to 5G and that's going to do everything, it's it's wrong. And there are always going to be other technologies and there are always going to be sort of backup technologies and backup of backup technologies, especially in these critical verticals.
00:05:25
Pablo Tomasi
So as a telco, because, you know, podcast is called Telco Drift, Always think about those multiple connectivity options and those redundancy options and how can you deliver them for the enterprise.
Spectrum and national priorities: AramcoDigital's Network Deployment and Vision 2030
00:05:40
Pablo Tomasi
So we move among two extremes, North America and Asia. Now we're going to the Middle East. So in 2024, AramcoDigital received the license for the 450 MHz band.
00:05:53
Pablo Tomasi
to deploy a network. Now, what is interesting about this network as far as understand, is currently being deployed, is that ah there is ah it's going to cover multiple industrial zones within the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
00:06:09
Pablo Tomasi
um but it's also tied to Saudi's 2030 vision and that's a key point like a lot of different countries have some plans some vision some projects and as a telcos and enterprise you need to play within those countries priorities The other really interesting piece is that this is in the 450 MHz band.
00:06:35
Pablo Tomasi
So the 450 MHz Alliance is helping to um to expand the use of this band for utilities and other similar scenarios.
00:06:46
Pablo Tomasi
And it shows how the sort of spectrum monetization, if you want, or how the use of like a single band in multiple countries can really help driving the market expansion.
00:06:59
Pablo Tomasi
So before moving to the next ah case study, which is going to be in Brazil, just wanted to you know ask you, is there any deployment that you would like me to discuss?
00:07:11
Pablo Tomasi
And if so, just put them in the comments. And next time that I'm having this type of podcast, this type of episode, I will be discussing whatever deployments you're suggesting, which are interesting and unusual bringing great results or unexpected results.
Vale and the Gradual Growth of Private LTE in Brazil's Mining Sector
00:07:28
Pablo Tomasi
and And hopefully, we can keep providing lessons for the market.
00:07:33
Pablo Tomasi
So back to Brazil then. This is deployment from a few years back. So in 2019, Vale signed a 21 million Brazilian real deal with Vivo for a deployment of private LTE at various sites.
00:07:48
Pablo Tomasi
So starting with the Caracas mine, and then plans for the Burkutu mine ah Minas Gerais.
00:07:59
Pablo Tomasi
Apologies for mispronunciation in this podcast, but you know, Not that he's getting all the all names correct. So why is this interesting? I already said mining is quite an advanced vertical.
00:08:13
Pablo Tomasi
This is interesting because it shows a sort of step-by-step incremental approach to private network. So you start in one site and then you move to another and another and another and that's the way the market is meant to be moving.
00:08:27
Pablo Tomasi
Slow and steady, additional sites, continuous stable growth. so very interesting and something that people should really appreciate you're not going to start deploying the world going to start one site at a time the other interesting thing is because the net was deployed to support autonomous trucks and and similar use cases so in the press release there was the mentioning of some of the benefits of using autonomous equipment.
00:08:59
Pablo Tomasi
And there was 15% reduction in fuel consumption and a 10% reduction in maintenance cost. So this autonomous equipment was, I believe, was using WiMAX before.
00:09:11
Pablo Tomasi
What is not clear to me is that the numbers that were shared were delivered by the previous tech or whether were delivered by private cellular so ah effectively what i want to to highlight here is critical is that there needs to be clarity on how the private cellular delivers potentially on top of other connected the option because that clarity helps the average reader to really understand why there needs to be this technology.
Manufacturing, Logistics, and Industrial Sites: Mystery and Digitization
00:09:47
Pablo Tomasi
Now the vendor I believe was Nokia in this case and you know sticking with Nokia they had a deployment with Bosch in Bosch Stuttgart Feuerbach factory Bosch had plans to gradually roll out 5G to around 250 plants that Bosch has around the globe.
00:10:08
Pablo Tomasi
So it's interesting once again, you see that step-by-step approach. The other interesting thing is that the initial network had eight small cells covering 10,000 square meters.
00:10:20
Pablo Tomasi
So couple of lessons here. First, you're not going to get rich by selling the tiny boxes, small cells. And second, yeah after the announcement that there hasn't been any follow-ups in terms of like what Bosch is actually doing how the rollout is proceeding whether is proceeding or not so there's an element of mystery in private 5G because many companies are not gonna be telling me you are not gonna be telling us what they're actually doing with 5G.
00:10:53
Pablo Tomasi
The best scenario for this market is that 5G becomes such a critical technology that enterprises are not going to be willing to talk about it, but they're just going be purchasing it. And from an outside perspective, someone looking at the market, that becomes very tricky because you don't really know if the market is growing as it should be.
00:11:13
Pablo Tomasi
But that would be the ideal scenario. now from ah i believe was germany now we're moving to South Korea so CJ logistics are the deployed private in a warehouse again 22 small cell instead of 300 Wi-Fi access point so the company is estimating 15 percent saving on the infrastructure side So quite important to understand this this part of the equation.
00:11:43
Pablo Tomasi
the The TCO from the infrastructure side between private 5G and Wi-Fi can be like really positive for private 5G particularly when we start to think about large environments.
00:11:55
Pablo Tomasi
Now the network connects 100 handheld scanners, and and the benefits here is that yeah effectively the scanning goes faster. Instead of having to wait certain amount of time, you can scan things.
00:12:06
Pablo Tomasi
more you know quicker and so scanning operations increased productivity thanks to scanning operations that that are smoother increased by 20 percent now so the key takeaway here is that even like small improvements can have a better experience and that is critical to to justify the investment in the network
00:12:33
Pablo Tomasi
moving then from South Korea to France and in this back to 2022 Alcatel Submarine Networks inaugurated what was at the time, according to the press release, the largest private 5G in Europe.
00:12:51
Pablo Tomasi
What's interesting about here is that they mentioned two years of development and integration that covers like 50 000 square meters at the Calais site um And it's interesting because that's a long time and probably you can assume that you know before the deployment and integration there were a similar amount of time just you know to get the sales completed.
00:13:15
Pablo Tomasi
ah So you need to be patient. Large deployments are going to take a lot of time. The other interesting thing about this deployment is that um When you look at the use cases, you have digitization of industrial processes, defined as dematerialization of procedures, which in my mind is sort of replacing pen and paper.
00:13:38
Pablo Tomasi
Then you have getting sensor data from for tank storage tanks and optimizing energy resource management. So these are very mundane use cases and I think it is quite interesting to see how the real needs of the enterprise are not the far-fetched need of VR, drones and everything, but in most cases are sort of basic data collection and data availability needs.
00:14:10
Pablo Tomasi
Moving then again back to South Korea in Seoul, We have an amusement park that is using a private 5G network a 28 gigahertz band to transmit video sensor data effectively creating a 4D attraction that replicate the experience of roller coaster.
00:14:35
Pablo Tomasi
So this is a very interesting deployment. It's using millimeter wave, but also because it shows a unique case that that only belongs in this vertical, right?
00:14:47
Pablo Tomasi
So each vertical needs to have that... each player working vertical needs to have that unique understanding of what is needed
Unexpected 5G Applications: From Vineyards to Amusement Parks
00:14:57
Pablo Tomasi
in this vertical. In this case, you the the need is to boaden the the pool of people that can enjoy such a ride.
00:15:07
Pablo Tomasi
such a right back to Germany and we are talking about vineyards there is a 5G connected viticulture robot which works with a private 5G network as I believe is private but correct me if I'm wrong and it performs you know tasks such as soil cultivation and defoliation Germany, top of my mind, is not particularly well known for wines but I believe they have some some good white wines so any recommendation is welcome.
00:15:40
Pablo Tomasi
Why is this an interesting interesting deployment? Again, you see that there are some odds opportunities, unusual unexpected use cases beyond the usual industrial sites.
00:15:52
Pablo Tomasi
But also you see how for all the, you know, the bad about robots, in the longer term, robots are definitely going to play a role in this market. Now, how much 5G will affect this, I think is yet to be seen.
00:16:10
Pablo Tomasi
and from Germany let's go to Japan so JRC in partnership with Nagano City, Nagano Spirit, EXEO Group and and I believe a few other partners they are deploying a private 5G network um and that is for this stadium and the the White Ring, the home arena of the Shin Shubra Warriors so the the issue here is that the customer service, because of network congestions, was getting poor connectivity.
00:16:41
Pablo Tomasi
So the private network is used for electronic payments, mobile ordering, mobile ticketing, and if effectively really is improving the experience that the customers, that the visitors have.
00:16:52
Pablo Tomasi
Now, there are similar examples of this in the US, but I just came came across this one in Japan. I thought it was an interesting one. And again, the key takeaways is that sometimes it's difficult to find this precise KPI and it is about the experience better experience than turning into money and the other interesting bit is that sport it is quite ah quite a big opportunity I wouldn't say big but an interesting opportunity for private 5G so moving then to
00:17:26
Pablo Tomasi
Another ah use case that it's is using some of the more advanced, if you want, or future looking scenarios and this is like a USUNHOME group that is using a minimalist private network from ZTE to create 5G advanced immersive VR theater.
00:17:47
Pablo Tomasi
So the reason why this is interesting is because the the cloud rendering has been moved at the edge, and that's why you need private networks, private 5G because performs better than Wi-Fi.
00:18:00
Pablo Tomasi
But again, we're sticking with that idea of better experience for an end user or an end customer.
00:18:11
Pablo Tomasi
So yeah there are different ways for you to do the rendering. and key You can have backpack, you can have a headset, um But you're bringing it out of the backpack or the headset, effectively the people that are enjoying the VR show do not need to have a 5kg backpack or the whole experience they have he's is a little bit better.
00:18:36
Pablo Tomasi
And again, it may be difficult to really assess a clear KPI but at the end of of the day you can still see the benefit of this technology and and the potential of the technology in making everything a little bit better.
00:18:57
Pablo Tomasi
So the last example that quickly want to to discuss is the Shaanxi Coal Group China Telecom Huawei and Td tech and that's the Caojiatan smart mine so this once again mining is one of the most advanced verticals that already said so it's a challenging environment you have long tunnels they change so it's underground it's difficult to place base station you need have explosion proof of operation
00:19:30
Pablo Tomasi
If private 5G can deliver in such an environment, it probably can deliver in most enterprise environments. It doesn't matter what vertical you are in. But the other thing that is interesting for me is that um so the way that Private 5G was used here created in the supporting the smart mining project that streamlined 116 subsystems.
00:19:51
Pablo Tomasi
So the idea is that you're moving from different silos, different protocols, different technology in using 5G as a foundation of enabling the silos to be broken and to become sort of a unique ah set of data, set of solutions.
00:20:09
Pablo Tomasi
And i think that should be the end goal for a lot private deployment, just breaking silos. As simple as that. Once you do that, then private 5G becomes that that essential technology that can really help an enterprise in its further digitization process.
00:20:26
Pablo Tomasi
So that's you know these are some of the unusual deployments I came across that i thought were interesting. Again, anything that I missed, feel free to to drop a comment and let me know so we'll be happy to discuss them in the next podcast.
00:20:39
Pablo Tomasi
And probably I'll talk to you again in a couple of weeks' time. Have a fantastic day.