01 February 2024

Paul McHugh, area director UK, Cradlepoint

Wi-Fi is a type of wireless local area network (WLAN) that is favoured for supplying wireless connectivity to the home, office, campus and other facilities with “best effort” connectivity. While it can work in many environments, it is best suited indoors. Meanwhile, cellular connectivity is the dominant player outdoors, on mobile phones and many other devices.

However, recent events and connectivity ecosystem evolution have triggered significant changes to the dynamic between the two. The roll out of 5G has brought increased capacity, coverage, mobility, speeds, and lower latency. Meanwhile, Wi-Fi 6 is getting closer to cellular with increased capacity, coverage, and higher speeds.

Another important shift is cellular has become an attractive alternative to Wi-Fi for enterprises — specifically for those looking for greater support for business critical applications, wanting complete control of their network. This is evident in the rise of private cellular networks (PCNs), among today’s enterprises. Helping drive this growth in enterprise PCN are changes to spectrum policy, including the allocation licensed spectrum for enterprises. This enables enterprise companies to operate their own PCNs and exercise complete control over the network more easily.

As the enterprise evolves, three major wireless technologies are increasingly co-existing: public cellular, private cellular and Wi-Fi.

However, thanks to PCNs and the enhanced performance they provide in the form of increased coverage, mobility, reliability, security, and predictable network performance — enterprises receive something they’ve never possessed before: choice.

The Acceleration of Private Network Adoption

So, why may some enterprises be opting for private 5G or LTE over Wi-Fi? One of Wi-Fis limitations includes reliability. Because Wi-Fi operates on unlicensed spectrum, it may be available but not necessarily useable because of signal interference, traffic congestion or a minimal coverage area. In terms of security and capacity, Wi-Fi also comes up short when compared to a private 5G network. For example, private cellular networks can eliminate credential-based attacks thanks to SIM-based authentication. Network users must have approved physical SIMs or electronic SIMs to access the network, giving enterprises more control over who enters their network. Also, even if a bad actor gets their hands on a device with an approved SIM, they’d only have access to the portions of the network for which that device is approved.

In terms of mobility, cellular networks are deterministic – meaning the network determines how to assign cellular clients to the cellular network access points (APs), and when to handoff to another cellular AP based on signal strength, QoS (quality of service) standards assigned by the enterprise network administrator, and other identifiers. Since Wi-Fi networks are not deterministic, this vastly improves the network reliability for mobile devices that roam between cellular APs in a PCN.

The Critical Role of Network Scale in Enterprise Connectivity

Providing connectivity for large areas isn’t easy. When it comes to coverage, in many situations private cellular networks make a lot more sense as well. Often, private cellular can cover 10x the space outdoors compared to traditional Wi-Fi.

A warehouse or an outdoor storage yard could require hundreds of Wi-Fi access points. That’s a lot of hardware to install and maintain. In contrast, a company could adequately cover the same area with a few dozen 5G private cellular access points. The same dynamics also apply for seaports, manufacturing facilities, campus environments, and mining operations.

Then, there’s the question of reliability. Many warehouses and industrial environments now use sensors and other devices to connect or have more visibility into their operations and machinery requiring the constant sharing of data between machinery and databases. When it comes to automation and robotics, the lower latency that private 5G offers means greater control for enterprise users.

Then there’s the way 5G combines with edge computing, which provides near real-time processing by bringing data processing to the point of data creation, such as a factory or warehouse floor instead of the cloud. The low latency necessary for real-time data transfer, the control of the network across which that data transfers, and the inherent security a PCN provides that data is why PCNs are more reliable.

Effortless and Fortified: The Appeal of Private 5G Networks

Lastly, what’s become increasingly difficult for the enterprise to ignore is that with the maturation of private cellular solutions, the current value proposition for Wi-Fi to support business and mission critical applications continues to shrink. PCN solutions are not only more comprehensive, but enterprises will find it’s easier than ever to deploy and manage them after deployment.