After a dip in the second half of 2024, activity in the first half of 2025 showed a return to growth in mobile private network deployments. Enterprises are adopting private networks to improve efficiency and enable data-driven control rather than merely to provide connectivity. Three defining characteristics of private networks include dedicated resources, dedicated user groups or SIMs, and customised KPIs to meet specific use cases. Between January and July 2025, 98 new deployment announcements raised the total to 962 since 2014. Manufacturing led new activity (22%), followed by ports (12%), airports (10%), and media, entertainment and sport (10%), with rising use for automation and IoT. 5G is the predominant technology choice, accounting for the majority of recent deployments and often reducing the need for network slicing or dual-technology setups.
The analyst's Private network deployment tracker contained three defining characteristics of a private network: dedicated resources, including network infrastructure, platform and/or spectrum which may not be physically dedicated but can be logically dedicated such as in network slicing; dedicated user groups/SIMs where access to the network is controlled and limited to a group of certain users who may have logically dedicated SIMs, which may be virtual; and customised KPIs where the network is designed and customised to meet use case requirements that can't be met by best-effort public networks.
The report also highlighted just how 5G mobile networks were the dominant choice for private network deployments, outpacing alternatives such as network slicing, 4G and dual 4G-5G setups. STL believes that with its high performance, 5G often meets enterprise needs on its own, reducing the need for more complex network slicing or dual technology deployments. Almost three in four (73%) MPN deployments since January 2024 were on 5G alone.
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