Having previewed its Private 5G offering last November, Amazon Web Services has announced the general availability of the managed service designed “to help enterprises set up and scale private mobile networks in their facilities in days instead of months,” according to the company.
However, in a blog discussing the new offering AWS Chief Evangelist Jeff Barr noted that “The private mobile network makes use of CBRS spectrum. It supports 4G LTE (Long Term Evolution) today, and will support 5G in the future, both of which give you a consistent, predictable level of throughput with ultra low latency.”
5G promises to delivering increased video content, new applications that require ultra-low latency connectivity to end-user devices, and support for smart IoT devices that demand extended coverage, more capacity and access control. But private mobile network deployments require enterprises to invest considerable time, money, and effort to design networks for peak capacity and procure and integrate software and hardware components from multiple vendors.
“Even if enterprises are able to get the network running, current private mobile network pricing models charge for each connected device that makes it cost prohibitive for use cases that involve thousands of connected devices,” the company said. “AWS Private 5G simplifies the procurement and deployment so that you can deploy your own private mobile network within days instead of months, scale up and down the number of connected devices rapidly, and benefit from a familiar on-demand cloud pricing model.”
AWS Private 5G runs on AWS-managed infrastructure andis self-service and API-driven. AWS said its Management Console allows users to specify where to build a mobile network and the number of devices they want to connect. Barr stated that it can scale for geographic coverage, device count and overall throughput. It also works with other parts of AWS and lets customers use AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) to control access to both devices and applications, according to the company.
AWS then delivers and maintains the small cell radio unit, the mobile network core and radio access network (RAN) software, and subscriber identity modules (SIM cards) required to set up a private mobile network and connect devices, according to the company.
AWS Private 5G is currently available in the US East (Ohio), US East (N. Virginia), and US West (Oregon) regions.
The technology advances are gradually, and hopefully it’s gonna be 5G