Boost Mobile has started to see rewarding progress from its years of deploying a cloud- and open-based greenfield 5G network but use case models that can take advantage of that next-generation network architecture – like private networks – have been slow to materialize.

Boost Mobile CTO Eben Albertyn told SDxCentral in a recent interview that the operator continues to see “very good traction,” but challenges remain. This is led by the continuing lack of 5G-enabled modules that can be embedded into warehouse-type private network use cases.

“Most of the modules, whether it's a dongle in a printer or a receiver in an AMR robot in a warehouse … those are pretty much still all 4G, notwithstanding you can still do a heck of a lot with 4G,” Albertyn said.

This has been a long-standing challenge for the broader private network space, and more specific to 5G. Douglas Bellin, global lead of business development for Smart Factories and Industry 4.0 at Amazon Web Services (AWS), brought up that same challenge during an interview with SDxCentral two-and-a-half-years ago.

“One of the benefits of 5G is lower latency,” Bellin said during an interview at the AWS re:Invent show in 2022. “But the problem with that is there’s not a lot of endpoints with 5G enabled. Phones, tablets, but robots? Not yet. … It's a chicken-and-the-egg that we're kind of fighting in the market, and we're working with some of those vendors who are making that hardware to become 5G-enabled.”

Belllin explained that the average machine age across manufacturing globally is 25 years old, which means there is not a lot of equipment that can communicate with a 5G radio. For wireless technologies, the age of these devices aligns with when Wi-Fi was still new and the cellular industry was deep in its 2G technology phase.

“It’s how you retrofit that and manage that and build that, and a lot of time that’s the basic that we have to come over,” Bellin said. “It’s not the [artificial intelligence] or [machine learning] – there’s a lot of that out there, there’s partners who can do that, there’s a lot of already done things with that. But, how do you get the data to it? Is it 5G could be the backhaul to that?”

Albertyn said that this dearth of module availability along with higher-level networking and application support is also hindering the ability for operators to assemble more complete system packages that they can present to enterprises.

“Approaching enterprise customers with a myopic solution around networking is not the way to go about it,” Albertyn said of this limited approach. “It needs to be a solution that has networking or connectivity, advanced connectivity, and components that present a solution to the customer.”

These conversations are a bit easier with enterprises that have well-stocked IT teams but more of a challenge for smaller entities, which generally are more interested in just basic connectivity needs.

“And because the networks are so good and they're not heavily congested as it is, things like slicing, which can potentially give you priority or separate your traffic out and keep it safe, isn't really necessary,” Albertyn said. “Everybody has a surplus of capacity anyway, so that's why it doesn't seem to be making it into the retail and SMB space.”

Is there a cable opportunity for Boost?

While private 5G opportunities remain tepid, Boost Mobile could tap into its excess capacity and open network architecture to help cable-based broadband providers extend their cellular services. Many of those players have seen tremendous growth in their cellular-based offerings that have been running through mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) models with Verizon, but Boost could provide an interesting option.

“In principle, it's a marriage made in heaven,” Albertyn said of that opportunity. “They have a network built for indoors, and we have a network built for outdoors, and we have an empty network. So, yeah, in principle, it makes a lot of sense.”

Cable-based broadband providers are increasingly being asked about this potential union, however interest remains cold.

Comcast CFO Jason Armstrong at an investor conference earlier this month noted that more than 90 percent of the broadband provider’s wireless traffic is offloaded to its Wi-Fi network. That number was echoed by Charter Communications CEO Chris Winfrey at the same investor conference.

“The most stunning part is for the three national MNO, or telco wireless companies, over 80 percent of their traffic goes over Wi-Fi as well,” Winfrey said. “Mobile is really just an extension or monetization of Wi-Fi for the vast majority.”