In this episode of the IoT For All Podcast, Ryan Chacon is joined by Samsung Networks’ TJ Maan to discuss the role of 5G private networks going into the future. Ryan and TJ open up the podcast by introducing what TJ is working on with Samsung and the basics of a private network and its benefits. They then move into a discussion about CBRS, the importance of 5G networks for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and considerations companies need to examine when deciding on going with a private or public network. The podcast wraps up with TJ talking about what we can expect from 5G in the near future as it relates to IoT.
Samsung Networks’ TJ Maan is responsible for the overall go-to-market and solution strategy for Enterprise Private LTE and 5G solutions. With more than 20 years of experience in the wireless networking industry, TJ has previously held leadership roles in Product Management, Technical Marketing, and Channels within companies that include Zebra Technologies, Motorola, and Extreme Networks.
Interested in connecting with TJ? Reach out on Linkedin!
About Samsung Networks
Samsung Networks has pioneered the successful delivery of 4G and 5G end-to-end network solutions including chipsets, radios, and core. Through ongoing research and development, Samsung drives the industry to advance 5G networks with its market-leading product portfolio from fully virtualized RAN and Core to private network solutions and AI-powered automation tools. The company is currently providing network solutions to mobile operators that deliver connectivity to hundreds of millions of users around the world.
Samsung offers a full portfolio of private 5G solutions that enable enterprises to simplify deployment and operation of their own networks. The portfolio includes a range of 5G solutions—including RAN, Core, transport and management system—to meet the specific needs of enterprises. The solutions come in three configurations for various enterprises: a compact one-box solution, a standard mid-sized solution and a premium solution for large-scale businesses.
Key Questions and Topics from this Episode:
(1:21) Introduction to TJ and Samsung
(2:47) General trends in IoT
(5:01) What is a private network?
(6:55) Benefits of private over a public network
(8:36) Examples of private networks
(11:04) Unique benefits for particular industries
(15:20) What is CBRS?
(17:23) Importance of 5G networks for digital transformation
(19:47) Considerations for deciding on private vs public
(21:48) Advancements to expect in 5G
Transcript:
– [Voice Over] You’re listening, to the IoT For All Media Network.
– [Ryan] Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the IoT for All Podcast. The number one resource and publication for the Internet of Things. I’m your host, Ryan Chacon. If you are watching this on YouTube, please like this video and subscribe to the channel. If you’re listening to this on a podcast directory somewhere else, please feel free to subscribe, to get the latest episodes as soon as they are out. All right, today’s episode. We have Samsung Network’s TJ Maan, who is responsible for the overall go to market and solution strategy for enterprise, private LTE and 5G solutions. We talk a lot about general trends in the industry, private networks, what they are, how do they compare to public networks, the benefits, advantages, disadvantages, those kind of things. Examples where private networks are already in use, CBRS, we talked about that a lot, kind of what it is, how does it compare to what’s out there right now. Talk about private 5G networks, advancements in 5G, and everything kind of looking forward throughout the rest of 2022 into 2023. Think you’ll get a lot of value outta this episode, but before we get into it, if any of you out there are looking to enter the fast growing and profitable IoT market, but don’t know where to start, check out our sponsor, Leverege. Leverege’s IoT Solutions Development Platform provides everything you need to create turnkey IoT products that you can white label and resell under your own brand. To learn more, go to iotchangeseverything.com. That’s iotchangeseverything.com. And without further ado, please enjoy this episode of the IoT for All Podcast. Welcome, TJ, to the IoT for All Podcast. Thanks for being here this week.
– [TJ] Thank you, Ryan, pleased to be here.
– [Ryan] Yeah, it’s great to have you. Let’s kick this off by having you give a quick introduction about yourself to our audience.
– [TJ] Sure, my name is TJ Maan and I lead the enterprise 5G solutions team within the network’s business and it’s our responsibility to drive growth for the network’s business within the enterprise segment with our 5G solution portfolio.
– [Ryan] Fantastic, can you elaborate a little bit on kind of what you all do as it relates to the IoT space and kinda the role you all play from your perspective?
– [TJ] Sure, so we are basically working with enterprise customers to deploy private LTE and private 5G solutions within various enterprise segments. And these networks are being deployed to enhance associate mobility, enterprise IoT use cases, you know, enhancing voice, push to talk type of capabilities within the enterprise, and really aimed at driving that digital transformation within the enterprise that has been taking place over the past many years but now that trend has accelerated given sort of the move to cloud and some of the technologies that are now available.
– [Ryan] Okay, fantastic. So let me start off by asking you this, from your perspective of things, where you kind of sit in the industry, tell me about some general trends you’re seeing as it kind of currently sits in IoT at this present day.
– [TJ] Sure, so enterprise networks, and more specifically enterprise wireless networks, have seen quite a dramatic evolution over the past decade in terms of improvements in speeds and bandwidth primarily driven by innovations through new WiFi type of standards, that have brought faster speeds and higher speeds and connectivity. But what we are seeing now is the pandemic over the past couple of years has accelerated trends in both the consumer as well as the enterprise markets, and we are undergoing a huge transformation in terms of digital behavior. We see that this is now becoming a very critical need for enterprises to undergo that digital transformation and as businesses emerge and they start to reopen, they will need to Internetize and embrace digital in a very significant way. And that’s not just online, but also across all their brick and mortar environments in places like stores, warehouses, manufacturing plants. So we are starting to see a big need for wireless connectivity and that, given the current challenges with existing WiFi type of technologies, private networks with 5G or private LTE really will become the foundation that ushers the enterprise into this era of IoT and this is the whole idea of adding that digital voice to physical assets where everything gets connected and hence can be managed. And of course, that brings a lot of benefits and from an operational transformation can really sort of do wonders for the enterprise organization.
– [Ryan] Fantastic, so you mentioned private networks. I wanted actually expand on that a little bit since it’s not a topic we’ve covered in great detail. We’ve talked about here and there, but can you explain to our audience what a private network is and kinda how it relates to, I guess, the public networks and kind of what people should be thinking about when they hear that?
– Sure, so a private network, and here we are referring to a private wireless network, is really just a wireless network that is owned and operated by the enterprise. That’s been sort of the traditional definition of a private network. And a great example of that is, you know, most enterprise organizations today have a very well deployed WiFi network and that is a private network, but now what’s starting to happen is there are coverage and capacity challenges with most WiFi deployments. And that is basically causing a huge need for more spectrum. And in the US, the FCC has opened up some mid-bag spectrum in the three or five gigahertz frequency range. And this is enabling enterprises to deploy private cellular. Initially as a private LTE network, and moving later to a private 5G network. And this is basically a spectrum that is free for enterprise customers to use. So they could either deploy this completely privately, owned and operated by the enterprise, or there is now also the option to work with a service provider where they can bring in the spectrum and can deploy a private ITE or private 5G network for the enterprise.
– [Ryan] So as somebody who’s kinda new to this, maybe listening to understand the benefits of a private network, can you talk to those benefits? Kinda what also are maybe advantages of going the private route versus more of the public route and at the same time, if there are any disadvantages or situations where maybe that’s not a route you should really explore?
– [TJ] Sure, so there is several benefits and they’re not just with this idea of owning it privately, but the idea of deploying a cellular network as a private network, that concept in and of itself has many benefits over other forms of private networks for you, as we talked about one example with being WiFi and the primary benefit here with cellular private networks is in terms of the reliability and coverage that you can get from a private cellular network greatly exceeds what you could get with a privately owned WiFi network. So in terms of cellular networks, LTE as a very, very mature technology, and the 5G standards are making it even more robust now. And that gives you a reliable network, it’s obviously a lot more secure, because it tends to have much more robust security protocols built in as compared to something like WiFi. So those are some of the key benefits of private cellular networks over WiFi.
– [Ryan] For sure, and as we kinda stay on the topic of private networks here, what are some examples of private networks being used and just kind of what industries are maybe using the most adoption when it comes to private networks?
– [TJ] So we are seeing adoption across the board, across enterprise verticals, but if we look at where some of the early commercialization is happening, then the four or five segments that stand out, and this is not the classic enterprise example, but in the education segment, as an example, there is a lot of distance learning initiatives, especially in rural locations where it’s not very easy to get broadband connectivity for students, and that is now driving a need for private LTE deployments by school districts to enable remote learning. And we see a lot of traction there. In the utilities segment, we are seeing a tremendous amount of interest where number of utilities have gone out and actually acquired a PAL spectrum within CBRS for deployment of private LTE networks and use cases there range from everything from grid monitoring to associate mobility type of use cases. We are seeing in the manufacturing segment, a number of use cases emerge around smart manufacturing and IoT. And so there are a lot of examples. We see also in the public sector, a big push towards these smart city initiatives are driving a need for private network deployments for smart parking, video surveillance, airport modernization, and a number of other type of initiatives that are at a state and local level needing these private networks. And then finally I would say also within the traditional retail, transportation, logistics, we see a great amount of interest from our customers to deploy next gen AR/VR type of use cases or enhancing that shopper experience by providing location based services and capabilities. So across industry segments, a lot of interest, and we are neck deep in trials and engagements with customers for private LTE and private 5G.
– [Ryan] Yeah, it’s fantastic. It’s very encouraging to see. Can you kind of elaborate a little bit on, before we move on to the next topic, around the unique benefits that you’re seeing for, let’s say, like manufacturing, education, government organizations, on why they’re kind of going towards the private side from a network perspective?
– [TJ] Sure, so let’s take manufacturing as sort of like one example and there’s obviously a need for now, as they automate operations on the manufacturing plant floor, for a high reliability, a high throughput network. And if you look at why that is, you know, midsize and smaller manufacturing facilities face many challenges with quality control and labor costs. So with smart manufacturing or smart factory, we are testing basically 5G enabled high resolution cameras on an assembly line that is taking pictures on a conveyor belt and these are very high resolution cameras, can take almost 25, 30 images per second, that are processed by an AI enabled image processor that is deployed as a edge compute component. And that piece is now able to compare images to a reference image that can detect defects actively as product is coming off the line and can even activate a robotic arm to pick up a component that does not sort of meet the quality specs and place it in a hopper for human analysis. So by just automating that piece of the operation, it allows many small to medium sized manufacturers to basically have a huge improvement in their quality control process at a much, much lower cost. So that is one example. We are seeing a number of use cases around AGVs and these are basically robots that operate on a factory plant floor to bring material and for basically material handling type of use cases. And these robots need connectivity and in a manufacturing environment which is full of metal and high interference type of environment, it’s difficult to provide that with just WiFi. So cellular technologies there are being tested for robots and AGV control as well. So do you wanna talk about education or?
– [Ryan] Yeah, I’d love to hear a little bit more about kind of the unique benefits as it applies to the education industry. ‘Cause I think that’d be interesting to learn.
– [TJ] Sure, so in the education segment, we’ve seen two types of use cases. One is basically on campus where in universities, and particularly for student housing, there is a great need for just basic broadband internet connectivity to access the internet, or in many cases, access online hosted content, and private LTE as a way to distribute that broadband network across a campus or across student housing facilities is one of the main use cases that we are seeing in higher ed. In K through 12 and in school districts, what we are seeing is that there are a number of schools that, especially during the COVID related shutdowns, had to provide remote learning capabilities, where students were online, attending online classes, from their homes and not in all cases had great internet options. So private LTE with remote connectivity was that network that served them well. And now this idea of perimeter access where students can have this as an option to access a great amount of very rich online content that is available within school districts, or in many cases, cloud hosted. That is what that network is used for, and then you know, connecting up school buses for many sort of safety related use cases as well. They’re able to use that same private ITE network.
– [Ryan] Fantastic, and there’s something you mentioned earlier which I wanted to expand on it. We’ve talked about it a couple times. It’s been a while since we’ve spoken about it, but CBRS. So first off, just tell us, can you talk just high level, what it is, what CBRS is, how’s it kind of compared and fit into what we’ve been talking about? And yeah, just start there.
– [TJ] With CBRS here, we are basically referring to the mid-band spectrum, and this is in the three or five gigahertz frequency range. The FCC has allocated this spectrum here in the US and it’s standardized as the TD LTE, band 48, for use primarily in the United States. So the work to deploy 5G within this band has also now been completed and it is referred to N 48 when we refer to 5G deployment in the CBRS band. So this is basically about 150 megahertz worth of spectrum. And part of this is available for any enterprise customer to use without any sort of license, referred to as the GAA band. And the other part of the spectrum, about 70 megahertz, is already being auctioned off as part of the PAL auctions, and number of enterprise customers have bid for it and have received an auction grant. And this is a slightly higher priority access within the band. But basically this is a spectrum that you don’t have to be a service provider or an operator. You could be a regular enterprise type organization and can deploy a cellular network, be it LTE or 5G within this band, and can operate it as your own private network. So this has obviously many benefits because we talked about it solves the coverage capacity and security related issues that we’ve had with WiFi. So right now we are seeing a great amount of adoption in the enterprise for CBRS based private LTE.
– [Ryan] Fantastic, I appreciate you kinda getting into that there. Let me ask you this. Why do you feel, and what are you seeing, that’s kind of allowing this to kind of be an encouraging thought around why private 5G networks are gonna be a key to kind of driving this future of digital transformation and some refer to it as the fourth industrial revolution, forward? Why is it such a big deal and why is it a key from your side of things?
– [TJ] Sure, that’s really a very good question because you know, this IoT idea, or digital transformation, which has been talked about for many, many years, and we’ve all seen slides on this. I think private LTE and 5G basically unleash IoT. And this now becomes the network foundation, which was in some ways missing before. So there were a lot of, you know, in bits and parts, IoT related initiatives that were being run in the enterprise, but now with this robust rich, spectrum that is available, it really solves those two key problems that we talked about. One, WiFi works great as an indoor technology, but with all the devices that are now coming in in the enterprise, this issue of device explosion is no longer something you see on just slides and something that gets talked about. It’s a very, very real problem and our customers basically need more spectrum to provide connectivity for things inside the enterprise. And outside, it has been always a coverage problem. So inside while it’s a capacity problem, outside it’s been, in outdoor environments, WiFi just does not scale to reach, you know, vast expenses like a shipping yard or an airport outdoors. So that coverage problem outdoors is solved by private LTE. So now you can connect, not just people, but things both inside and outside using the spectrum. And this really is now going to accelerate IoT deployment and drive that digital transformation that most enterprises are looking to do.
– [Ryan] Absolutely, before we wrap up here, I have a couple final questions. One of them is if I’m listening to this and trying to understand which route I should be going, private, public, or networks, what should I be thinking about? What’s important for me to be considering or looking at, as it relates to a potential deployment that my company is working on to decide which route is best? Is there kind of general advice you have when you speak with companies to kind decide which path to go?
– [TJ] Which path meaning privately owned or?
– [Ryan] Yeah, is private the right fit kinda thing, yeah.
– [TJ] Yeah, we believe that all types of enterprise customers are having to undergo this digital transformation in order to stay competitive, and in that case, spectrum is important and wireless connectivity is what provides that reach and that coverage and that capacity. So this is something which I think will happen across all customer segments. So in terms of the choice, that choice is really whether you want to go it out and follow more like a DIY type of an approach where, you know, traditional wired networks and compute infrastructure in the enterprise was owned, operated, for the most part by the enterprise IT, ’til some of these systems start to migrate to the cloud. Now with private networks, you have an option, either you can sort of go do it yourself, or you can work with an operator and they can bring in a spectrum that is not public spectrum that is privately owned and for that enterprise but that network is managed by the service provider because they have the expertise in setting up an EPC core and operating a mobile network. So I think that’s the choice, whether you wanna do it yourself or do it in conjunction or in partnership with the service provider.
– [Ryan] Makes total sense. Last question I have for you before we wrap up here. So what advancements in 5G and private networks do you expect to see kind of going forward throughout this year, into the next year? What are you most excited about? What can we expect?
– [TJ] So in terms of, again, what’s relevant from an IoT standpoint, there are vertical applications that require, you know, if you look at the three pillars of 5G, in terms of the benefits it provides, there is clearly enhanced mobile broadband as sort of the fast speed connection to the internet. There is URLLC or this idea of ultra reliable low latency communications capability. And then the third pillar is massive machine to machine type communication MMTC. So two out of those three pillars, you know, within 5G are targeting or enabling IoT in a very significant way. So there is a wide variety of industrial and factory automation use cases that will start to happen by enabling IoT networks with this extremely high link reliability. In 5G, with release 16, we’re looking at almost six nines, 99.999% reliability and coupled with the ultra low latency within that communication path. With 5G you’re looking at a round trip time of less than one millisecond, and that compares to about four to five milliseconds for WiFi. So this really is a very big benefit for rolling out a very large number of sensors or edge devices that can communicate with an edge compute device. And you know, edge compute that we haven’t talked about much is another big enhancement. The mobile edge computer Mac piece of 5G will go hand in hand with these IoT sensor deployments by providing sort of that machine learning AI engine at the edge that can in real time make decisions and can basically automate the whole operation, provide a lot of insights and data that can be further used for machine learning and for predictive analysis troubleshooting. And yeah, so those are some of the enhancements that are coming down the pike with 5G within private networks and those will greatly benefit enterprises that are looking to do IoT deployments.
– [Ryan] Fantastic, yeah, it’s always interesting to have conversations when we’re talking about networks, connectivity, because it plays such a critical role in the success of a deployment and the more options out there means more opportunity to find the perfect fit for the organization and the solution that they’re deploying, whether it’s the environment requires kind of unique connectivity, the number of sensors needs to be handled, the amount of data being exchanged, how quickly it needs to be exchanged, how much data it is at any given time. So the more opportunity we have and more options we have out there, I think it’s just better for the industry as a whole, from an adoption standpoint. And the private side is just opening up a whole new can of opportunity for organizations to deploy successfully solutions and see success with IoT, which would benefits everybody.
– [TJ] Indeed, yeah, I couldn’t agree more. And this is finally, you know, we always like to say this, is you cannot manage what you don’t measure. And up until now, all of these physical assets in the enterprise, there was no real way to reach out and monitor them and gather data from them. At least at scale. It was being done in bits and parts. But what private net cellular networks like private LTE or 5G do is bring that backbone and put that in place to be able to gather massive amounts of data that can then be used to drive efficiency and further do automation and reduce costs.
– [Ryan] Right, right, absolutely, yeah. I really appreciate you taking the time. This has been a great conversation. I wanted to ask a last thing is just for audience out there who wants to learn more, wants to engage kind of with Samsung around this topic, potentially follow up with any questions, what’s the best way to do that?
– [TJ] So our website, Samsung Networks website, has a lot of great information and we can provide a link to that at the end of this presentation. And that has a section for our private network solutions portfolio, some of the industries that can benefit from that. And there’s a lot of great information out there on our networks website.
– [Ryan] Awesome, yeah, we’ll be sure to include that information in everything that we do from a writeup perspective when we get this out to our audience. So TJ, thanks so much for your time. I really appreciate the insights, love what you have going on. And this is very exciting to kinda hear about it more in detail. I think our audience is gonna get a lot of value out of this so really appreciate you taking the time to do this today.
– [TJ] Likewise, Ryan, thank you for the time and appreciate the opportunity.
– [Ryan] Absolutely, thanks so much. All right, everyone. Thanks again for watching that episode of the IoT For All Podcast. If you enjoyed the episode, please click the thumbs up button, subscribe to our channel, and be sure to hit the bell notifications so you get the latest episodes as soon as they become available. Other than that, thanks again for watching and we’ll see you next time.
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