AWS made a big splash with its announcement of AWS Private 5G in November 2021. But the turn-key private wireless offering hasn’t yet become generally available.
AWS Director and General Manager of EC2 Core Product Management George Elissaios spoke at Fierce Wireless’ recent Private Wireless Networks Summit.
He indicated that AWS got into the private wireless business because it recognized that enterprise customers are connecting so many devices that they need a stronger technology than Wi-Fi in many cases.
“We see an exponential increase in wireless connectivity in every possible space and scenario,” said Elissaios. “We are literally connecting everything nowadays from the obvious phones and tablets to escalators and air conditioners in malls, to forklifts, to picking robots in warehouses. That goes especially for emerging applications that require ultra-low latency and high bandwidth, like for example, augmented reality.”
In terms of Wi-Fi, he said it’s easy to use and enjoys wide adoption. But as devices grow into the thousands, it reaches limitations, especially when enterprises want to ensure quality of service across different applications and device types. It’s also limited in range and coverage.
The first challenge that enterprises face when building their own private wireless network is deciding who to go to for help. “Some network equipment providers will have enterprise direct sales, while others will work through other channels or even work through communication service providers, themselves,” said Elissaios.
They’ll probably be required to collaborate with multiple vendors and possibly even a systems integrator to pull it all together. “Because of this, these private networks consists of different vendor stakeholders and modules, they involve different pricing schemes that may not play well with each other, or even technical integration,” he said.
AWS aims to offer an end-to-end solution that is easy to order and deploy and also easy to manage and maintain long term.
Elissaios describes AWS’ Private 5G offering in the above video. He said, “Essentially what enterprise customers want is a cloud model.”
One thing that AWS can do, that others perhaps can’t, is to allow customers to start small and scale up as they need. AWS has already perfected this pay-as-you-go model with its other cloud services.
For private 5G, he said AWS delivers all of the hardware on location for the customer, including the small cell radios and the AWS servers that power the network. The network connects automatically back to AWS to self-provision. The customer inserts the SIMs into its devices. The enterprise can manage its network from the AWS console and APIs to do things like adjust throughput, add or remove devices and monitor the network.
He said AWS Private 5G will be generally available later this year.