5g With Edge Computing: How Will It Affect The Enterprise In The Next Five Years

Today, all enterprises have become data-native. And the ever-increasing amounts of data, driven by customer expectation of a personalized and immersive experience will grow exponentially in the coming years with 5G. The deployment of 5G is already taking place in phases. Several research reports point to a massive growth in connected devices that will see an average individual interacting thousands of times in a day with everyday devices. What we are witnessing now is unprecedented in many ways— digitization has taken place at an accelerated level, e-commerce channels witnessed 10 years of growth in just three months. 

With 5G’s promise of high-bandwidth and low latency wireless data delivery, the computational ability will be pushed to the edge from the cloud, opening a host of opportunities in edge computing. It has the power of changing the world around us, as we know it now.  Some enterprises have already started harnessing it, however, I think it will have a much broader impact across sectors in the next five years. 

1. Real-time response: By localizing analysis of data a whole new range of devices, AR & VR products and, IoT-enabled equipment such as wearables, vehicles, infrastructure, and manufacturing machinery will be able to interact quicker, reducing the time taken for analysis and decision making. Edge computing together with AI will create new opportunities for market players to grow their revenue streams. 
2. New investments: Interconnectivity of edge devices that create new business models combining intelligent workflows and automation will gain momentum. Many organizations are positive that their investments in edge computing will result in positive ROI in a short period of time. Telecom companies, for instance, can offer edge-enabled services utilizing their existing resources. They can also partner with large organizations having deep edge expertise to roll out such services.  
3. Better operational efficiency: 5G will resolve the connectivity issues that hinder many industry verticals, including  logistics, transport, manufacturing, energy and utilities. The key benefits of 5G will provide help industries with:

• Low latency and high reliability
• Improved machine communication and collaboration
• Higher security and service quality
• Better internet speed

Together with 5G, the use of Edge computing will result in improved operational efficiency as real-time data analysis and decision-making will foster better coordination and responsive behavior. Automated workflows will increase productivity. Ability to manage operations will give a much-needed boost to business continuity and change management programs and provide better visibility for corporate-level strategy making. 

4. Reduce operating cost: Using edge infrastructure enabled by 5G will reduce operating costs for organizations across the sectors. It will make it easier to scale with high reliability in the network. Take the case of the world's busiest port-- Ningbo-Zoushan in China. The port operators are using 5G in tandem with Edge Computing to make the infrastructure smart with large-scale IoT deployment. This is transforming the port operations, bringing down costs and enhancing worker safety. 

5. Energy Efficiency: Reduced data latency due to the deployment of 5G will save energy as the to-and-fro movement of data from the cloud will decrease considerably with the edge. 

6. Security: The massive adoption of 5G by industries in the coming years will see Edge powering most of the machines, tools, and devices. However, the move away from the centralized network to 5G’s distributed software-based routing will open a host of cybersecurity issues. Securing edge computing devices will mean increased use of encrypted tunnels, firewalls and access control for enterprises implementing the technology. Moreover, the continued maintenance of edge computing resources are likely to consume a portion of IT budgets on a recurring basis. Gartner calls it Secure Access Service Edge (SASE)—a category of hardware and services for enabling edge security. 

Going forward, I believe there will be interesting developments in the space that one should watch out for. 5G connectivity with edge will see edge computing being widely used by enterprises. By 2025, Gartner predicts 75% of enterprise-generated data being created and processed outside a centralized data center. 

Well, I always believe that future technologies will be collaborative, harnessing the power of one will multiply the impact of another. The shift to cloud native network functions and Edge Computing will open doors to new opportunities for service providers to move beyond traditional models.