Forrester report reveals global trends in private 5G adoption

Forrester has released its latest report, titled "The State Of Private 5G Networks, 2024", which provides significant insights from a survey conducted on over 1,100 global telecom decision-makers. These individuals are from organisations currently involved in or planning to adopt private 5G networks, aimed at understanding the evolving use cases and development within various industries.

The report highlights that 44% of the surveyed telecom decision-makers indicated that the creation of private 5G networks is part of their organisations' plans for deploying 5G. However, only 34% of these decision-makers, from organisations either implementing, expanding, or planning to adopt private 5G networks, fall into the 'advanced' category. This suggests that many organisations are still in the early stages of adoption.

Adoption rates of private 5G networks are relatively consistent across different regions, including North America, Asia Pacific, and Europe. This uniformity indicates a global trend towards deploying private 5G, albeit at varying levels of advancement and maturity.

According to the report's lead author, Forrester Senior Analyst Octavio Garcia, private 5G networks are still maturing and are often implemented as trials with limited production systems worldwide. Garcia pointed out that enterprises will continue to depend on the availability of devices and chipsets as they implement production-grade private 5G networks and their use cases over the next 12 to 24 months.

The analysis highlights that certain industries, such as manufacturing, have a higher presence of 'advanced' organisations when it comes to private 5G implementation. Video-related use cases are among the top categories for these advanced organisations. However, the report also identifies several challenges that need to be addressed to speed up market progression. These include concerns related to security, total cost of ownership (TCO), and chipset availability.

The Forrester report underscores the potential of private 5G networks but also points out the need for industry stakeholders to resolve these critical issues to fully realise the market's capabilities and benefits.