HPE Aruba Launches “Cloud Native” Private 5G Network with 4G/5G Small Cell Radios
HPE Aruba has launched an end-to-end private 5G network platform which is designed to help customers accelerate and simplify the deployment and management of private 5G networks, provide high levels of reliable wireless coverage across large campus and industrial environments, and open new, untapped use cases for private cellular. This integration follows HPE’s 2023 acquisition of private cellular technology provider Athonet.
Highlights:
- HPE Aruba Networking provides a comprehensive solution that removes the complexity of managing, deploying and purchasing enterprise private cellular networks.
- With this expansion of its secure edge-to-cloud portfolio, HPE Aruba Networking becomes the only global enterprise infrastructure vendor to provide comprehensive Wi-Fi and private 5G solutions.
- HPE Aruba Networking Enterprise Private 5G provides high levels of reliable wireless coverage across large campus and industrial environments, opening up new, untapped use cases for private cellular.
“Enterprise and industrial customers are increasingly seeking to deliver wireless coverage in demanding environments, including large outdoor areas, serving fast-moving clients, and providing deterministic access in dedicated spectrum,” said Stuart Strickland, wireless chief technology officer, HPE Aruba Networking.
“The complexity of conventional approaches to private cellular networks has held them back. Building on HPE Aruba’s networking history of wireless innovation and leadership, we have uniquely positioned ourselves to enable new applications for private cellular by integrating Athonet core cellular solutions with our traditional strengths in enterprise networking.”
With the debut of HPE Aruba Networking Enterprise Private 5G, enterprises can increase reliable, secure, high-performance connectivity with a fully integrated private 5G network that features:
- An end-to-end offering that includes a 4G/5G core, HPE ProLiant Gen11 servers, SIM/eSIM cards, 4G/5G small cells, and dashboard.
- New 4G/5G small cell radios from HPE that provide indoor/outdoor coverage, eliminating the need to integrate and use a separate management tool from a 3rd party vendor.
- Simplified cloud-native management and automation for subscriber management, deployment management, core monitoring and radio monitoring, with future plans for integration with HPE Aruba Networking Central.
- Expanded AI data capture and delivery for building AI data lakes and activating inference solutions.
- Interoperability with shared spectrum for private enterprise use: Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum in the US, and globally, where regulatory frameworks allow, beginning in 2025.
- Simplified configuration with pre-integrated, tested solution including everything needed to deploy an enterprise private 4G/5G network.
- Ability to deploy solutions in under 30 minutes with zero touch provisioning and configuration wizards that mask the 3GPP cellular complexity.
“HPE Aruba Networking Enterprise Private 5G is a significant step forward to solve for the complexity, cost, control, and management challenges associated with many private network deployments today,” said Patrick Filkins, Senior Research Manager, IoT and Telecommunications, IDC. “HPE Aruba Networking takes a grounded approach focusing on how to most efficiently integrate a private cellular network within an enterprise’s existing IT framework, streamlining network and device management through the use of familiar tools, as well as dynamically assigning and preserving device policy across 4G/5G, Wi-Fi, and wired LAN networks.”
“‘Many private network solutions are too complex, even for large enterprises with internal network expertise,” said Tom Rebbeck, Partner, Analysys Mason. “We expect customers to embrace solutions that can make private networks easier to deploy and manage.”
“For IronYun’s Vaidio Platform to be able to provide AI inferencing at the edge and drive accurate AI video search results, we needed an infrastructure that provided fast, available and reliable bandwidth without any complexity,” said Paul Sun, IronYun CEO. “We found it with HPE Aruba Networking, which provides us with all the components needed to deliver an end-to-end private 5G network for AI. HPE Aruba Networking’s private 5G network is the technical foundation for all Vaidio functions for real-time video analysis and AI inferencing that deliver AI insights to help improve security outcomes.”
“Private cellular, with its wide area, deterministic coverage, is the ideal fit for Disc Golf Network’s global live competition coverage of the Disc Golf Pro Tour,” said Baker Helton, DGPT Vice President of Business Administration. “The new HPE Aruba Networking Enterprise Private 5G offering will make it that much easier for companies to do what we’ve done and meet their requirements for pervasive coverage with an integrated offering using CBRS.”
5 Reasons to adopt HPE Aruba Networking Enterprise Private 5G
HPE completes acquisition of private 5G leader Athonet
Mike Dano, LightReading:
Tesla, Johnson & Johnson, Audi, Cummins, Nvidia and the Disc Golf Pro Tour are some of the latest names to jump into private wireless networking. According to some players in the market, momentum is starting to reach a tipping point.
Verizon’s Dan Falkner, who is VP of wireless business products, told Mobile World Live that private wireless networking is starting to mature as customers begin to understand the benefits of the technology, and analysts agree.
“Private wireless is now growing at a formidable pace,” said analyst Stefan Pongratz, of Dell’Oro Group, in a recent release. The firm reported in April that full year revenues in the private wireless radio access network (RAN) market accelerated around 40% in 2023 (though that’s still just 2% of the overall RAN market).
“This stands in contrast to public RAN and enterprise WLAN – both segments are projected to contract in 2024,” Pongratz said in a nod to the ongoing troubles of RAN heavyweights like Ericsson and Nokia.
Indeed, it’s likely why WLAN equipment giant HPE recently announced the addition of 5G to its Aruba-branded enterprise networking portfolio, a product that stems from the company’s acquisition last year of private wireless networking vendor Athonet.
“HPE Aruba Networking is uniquely positioned to enable new applications for private cellular by integrating the Athonet mobile core solutions with our traditional strengths in enterprise networking,” Stuart Strickland, HPE’s wireless chief technology officer of Aruba Networking, said in a release.
Making it simple
In its pursuit of private wireless 5G, HPE is joining the likes of Celona and Dense Air in developing its own RAN equipment, according to Omdia Analyst Pablo Tomasi. Omdia and Light Reading are both owned by the same parent company, Informa.
Tomasi noted that HPE’s 5G equipment will first support deployments in the 3.5GHz CBRS band in the US and will later expand to other bands including C-band in the US, 3.5GHz in Europe and 4.5GHz in Japan.
More broadly, though, HPE wants to make 5G as easy for enterprises to deploy as Wi-Fi, according to Tomasi.
“For HPE, the future of private 5G is rooted in simplicity. An enterprise can get RAN, core, hardware, integration, management and SIM cards from a single company. Yet, simplicity is an elusive target in private 5G,” he wrote.
Part of the problem is price. HPE may want to appeal to smaller businesses that currently use Wi-Fi, Tomasi said, but doing so may drag down prices for the whole private wireless industry, thereby cutting into HPE’s margins.
“Overall, HPE shows a strong commitment to this market and the top-level solid strategy. However, this is the first of many moves that HPE needs to make, if it is to become a leader in the nascent private 5G market,” Tomasi summarized.
https://www.lightreading.com/private-networks/high-profile-clientele-help-accelerate-private-wireless