Security, resiliency key drivers for 5G private network adoption: STL Partners-Spirent study

Security and resiliency have emerged as the key drivers that are motivating enterprises to consider the adoption of 5G private mobile networks, according to the findings of a survey conducted by STL Partners, commissioned by test and assurance solutions provider Spirent Communications.

In fact, the study predicts the size of the private network market to reach $7.7 billion by 2027. It also underscored the critical role of service-level management since private networking directly enables enterprise business outcomes that are impacted by network performance and service-level agreement (SLA) compliance.

“Private networks are emerging as a viable alternative to traditional enterprise networks, offering a wide range of benefits,” said Spirent’s principal strategist for private networks, Marc Cohn. “But the disaggregated private networking ecosystem, wide range of domains, technologies and diversity of user cases result in much greater complexity than the traditional wide area networks (WANs) enterprises have previously relied on.”

One of the key findings of the study is that automation and continuous testing across the lifecycle from network/device design through to site acceptance testing and into live operational assurance and SLA management is essential for deploying and managing private networks, and to reduce operational costs.

It noted that enterprises are willing to pay a premium for an increase in service level requirements. However, stringent SLAs are viewed as difficult to achieve on current public networks.

The study pointed out that global systems integrators (GSIs) and cloud service providers could have “advantages as future lead suppliers”, as manufacturers tend to favor GSIs due to “complex environments and use cases”, while observing that cloud service providers are well positioned due to their IT buyer relationships.

“Comprehensive and robust private network service level management is an essential tool to ensure business outcomes as planned. With this in place, a significant opportunity exists for MNOs and CSPs to monetise their investments in 5G,” says Cohn.