The IoT industry hasn’t seen a hype cycle as strong as the one for 5G since wireless networking, and some enterprises are still waiting in the wings to see if 5G tech lives up to the excitement.
Now is the time to start moving, and not just for the faster speeds, lower latency and greater bandwidth inherent in the protocol. Much more important is the new business model, and therefore profit center, represented by 5G as a Service executions.
Enterprise 5G as a Service is all about managing and monitoring enablement technologies across a wide variety of industries, and here we’ll look at two standout early use cases.
Medical Centers
Medical facilities and especially hospitals need to support many simultaneous constituencies, including patients, visitors, doctors, nurses, technicians, and administration. In addition, the pure tonnage of sensors, machinery data and asset tracking capabilities that are required for modern healthcare make the capabilities of 5G less an add-on than a necessity. All of this is stressed in high-volume or big emergency situations, often pushing these facilities beyond their capabilities (for reference, see the last two years). Some leading hospitals are using private 5G networks, managed by a platform service provider, to manage a reliable, secure, low latency, high bandwidth dedicated network that is stable enough for everyday use and resilient enough to handle crisis mode.
Construction
The construction industry has long been a leader in Industrial ioT implementation, thanks to their need for connectivity in near real-time and often in remote places. Enterprises breaking ground on business parks and new buildings need to plan for tenants that will require 5G connectivity, often replacing or coexisting with Wi-Fi and network cables. These companies are building with 5G in mind, but don’t want to be the manager of such services moving forward. Enter 5G as a Service. Construction plans that support fewer cables and Wi-Fi router deployment points reduce complexity and cost, while enterprise 5G infrastructure investments are potential profit centers, by reselling and whitelabeling services to in-house enterprises or selling roaming virtual capabilities to mobile network operators.
These are only two of the many industries that will be adopting 5G at the enterprise level -- and you could be getting involved now.
Ken Briodagh is a storyteller, writer and editor with about two decades of experience under his belt. He is in love with technology and if he had his druthers would beta test everything from shoe phones to flying cars.Edited by
Luke Bellos
