What role can open RAN technology play in private mobile network systems?

Enterprises will not integrate and consume open RAN directly. They clearly prefer pre-integrated private mobile network solutions supported by a managed service provider.

Nevertheless, there are arguments that open RAN technology can be used to create private network systems that better serve enterprise needs.

These arguments generally fall into three themes:

A range of companies can use open RAN to create pre-integrated RAN systems for private mobile networks. This includes network operators, which are major suppliers of private solutions, typically using a managed services model.

A question in the new Heavy Reading 2023 Open RAN Operator Survey seeks to understand the role operators think open RAN will play in their private network strategy. (To download a copy of the survey, click here.)

The survey results, shown in the figure below, reveal that operators see an important role for open RAN in private 5G networks. But their position is nuanced.

Close to a third of respondents (31%) expect open RAN to be "a critical part of our private 5G offer." This is a strong endorsement given the two-year timeframe of the question. But it is short of a majority, which indicates operators have reservations about how well the technology and use case are currently matched.

The largest respondent group is the 40% that says, "open RAN will play an important role." This view holds that open RAN can be part of a private network design — even if it is not "critical" — and keeps the door open to using the technology in the future for parts of the system. It is essentially a pragmatic outlook.

Does your organization expect to use open RAN technology in private 5G enterprise networks within the next two years?

Figure 1: (Source: Heavy Reading)

Given the arguments outlined above, should we have expected a stronger response for the "critical" option from the operator survey respondents? No, not really. The specificity of the question — referring to 5G (the private network ecosystem is primarily 4G today) — and the two-year timeframe perhaps caused respondents to be somewhat cautious.

Most operators already have vendor-integrated solutions in their private mobile network portfolio. To switch to open RAN technology, operators must be confident that it will deliver the performance and reliability their customers need and that it will come with low cost operations and lifecycle management. This underlines that although the technology is promising, there is still work for the ecosystem to do.

Additionally, operator private network strategies are likely to include a mix of technology solutions. Heavy Reading also expects operators to act as channel partners for diverse private mobile network suppliers (e.g., hyperscalers and enterprise vendors), and this is another way open RAN can penetrate the market and become part of operators' private network offers.

This blog is sponsored by Qualcomm.