Summary

Private Wireless RAN is standing out in the otherwise gloomy RAN market. Preliminary findings show total RAN (public plus private) revenues declined in 2023 and RAN market conditions remain challenging.  The downturn in the broader RAN market is raising the expectations of potential growth opportunities such as Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) and private wireless. In contrast to FWA, which is a smaller but more mature segment, private wireless is a massive market opportunity.

One of the challenges with measuring the private wireless market is that it is not a specific technology but rather a broader term encompassing a wide range of technologies, segments, business models, and architectures. More importantly, the narrative and scope are evolving as the understanding of how enterprises can tap into the various private wireless options changes.

Our ambitions remain unchanged – we aim to capture the progress of enterprise cellular, intending to understand its impact on the broader RAN market ultimately.  The “enterprise” term is, by default, ambiguous. In this report, we consider private wireless to be nearly synonymous with 3GPP’s vision for Non-Public Networks (NPNs). According to 3GPP, NPNs are intended for the sole use of a private entity, such as an enterprise. NPNs can be deployed in various configurations, utilizing both virtual and physical elements located close or far away from the site. NPNs might be offered as a network slice of a Public Land Mobile Network (PLMN), hosted by a PLMN, or deployed as a completely standalone network.

Although the industry scope of private wireless is evolving and moving towards a broader definition that includes a variety of on-premise and virtual 3GPP and non-3GPP solutions, private wireless is in this report confined to 3GPP-based technologies (Wi-Fi, LoRa, TETRA, and P25 are excluded).

In this report, it is our objective to dig deeper about the private wireless RAN opportunity and assess if this time is any different—is there enough momentum and progress with private wireless to ensure this opportunity will play a significant role in future 4G and 5G rollouts?

The report addresses such questions as:

•     What is Private Wireless?
•     Private Wireless has been a hot topic for some time – what is different this time?
•     What RAN solutions are best tailored for private wireless?
•     Which technologies are required to take private wireless to the next level?
•     How will the role of the operators, enterprises, and cloud players change with private wireless?
•     How much of private wireless will be addressed using the existing macro network vs. new local dedicated networks?
•     How will the private wireless RAN market evolve over the next five years?
•     Who are the leading private wireless RAN suppliers worldwide and outside of China?

The report includes a 5-year forecast for the following areas:

•     Private Wireless RAN – Coverage (Campus Network, Wide-Area)
•     Private Wireless RAN – Technology (LTE, 5G NR)
•     Private Wireless RAN – Region (North America, EMEA, China, Asia Pacific exclude China, CALA)

The report includes quarterly updates for the following areas:

•     Private Wireless RAN – Region (Worldwide, Excluding China)
•     Private Wireless RAN – Coverage (Campus Network, Wide-Area)

Press Release