AWS to take on Microsoft Azure in private 5G

AWS versus Microsoft in private 5G

Once out of preview mode, AWS Private 5G would compete with Microsoft Azure's private multi-access edge compute (MEC) system. Both products also support 4G LTE networks, which dominate the private networking market today.

Microsoft's pMEC goes "a bit beyond" what AWS announced by including cloud services, such as video analytics, said IDC analyst Patrick Filkins.

AWS and Microsoft offer private networks to connect more enterprise devices to their cloud services. However, their massive customer bases could provide a significant boost to the young private 5G market, Filkins said.

Analysts expect private 5G to grow within industries ranging from manufacturing and healthcare to oil and gas, utilities and transportation. Based on next-generation 5G wireless technology, the cellular networks are significantly faster, have lower latency and handle more devices than the previous-generation 4G LTE networks.

IDC predicts global sales of private 4G LTE/5G infrastructure to grow from $945 million in 2019 to $5.7 billion in 2024.

A potential problem with AWS Private 5G is using unlicensed Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) to transmit data. Tom Nolle, president of CIMI Corp., a strategic technology consultancy, said organizations could end up competing for the same spectrum.

"There's also a question of the compatibility of the radio units with available unlicensed spectrum because the ranges aren't the same in every country," Nolle said.

Filkins said AWS would likely have to support a spectrum other than the U.S.-focused CBRS.

"It remains unclear to me how the AWS solution scales beyond the United States, as it is so heavily reliant on the CBRS play," he said. "I suspect they will work with partners to address other spectra as well."

Jeff Barr

Indeed, AWS Chief Evangelist Jeff Barr said the cloud provider's partners would address customers' spectrum issues.

"There's going to be different rules for spectrum use and consumption in the different geographies that we ultimately make the service available in," he said.

AWS has a mobile edge computing platform composed of a Verizon private 5G network and AWS Outposts. The latter is an on-premises IT system that replicates the infrastructure, services, APIs and tools found on AWS. The combined product is a platform for applications in factories, warehouses and corporate business campuses.

Barr sidestepped whether enterprises using Outposts could use AWS Private 5G in place of the Verizon service.

The AWS product is "more about just offering connectivity that our customers have been asking for," he said.

Antone Gonsalves is news director for the Networking Media Group at TechTarget. He has deep and wide experience in tech journalism. Since the mid-1990s, he has worked for UBM's InformationWeek, TechWeb and Computer Reseller News. He has also written for Ziff Davis' PC Week, IDG's CSOonline and IBTMedia's CruxialCIO, and rounded all of that out by covering startups for Bloomberg News. He started his journalism career at United Press International, working as a reporter and editor in California, Texas, Kansas and Florida.