In the lead up to his keynote at Interconnect World 2025 in Melbourne next week, BAI Communication Chief Technology Officer, Stephen Farrugia, sat down with w.media’s Simon Dux. Together they discussed Stephen’s key takeaways from Mobile World Congress, his view for 5G in Australia, and the key themes delegates should expect from his session at the event.
Australia has fared better than many countries, particularly Europe, with its 5G rollout – 5G stand-alone networks are already growing and the regulatory system, overseen by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), is encouraging private 5G networks, at least from a spectrum point of view. It remains to be seen which operators will build out and where.
One spectrum winner, BAI Communications, secured up to 50 MHz of 3.8 GHz in major metropolitan and regional centres around the country. The 3.8 GHz band spectrum has been allocated through an area-wide apparatus licence, where each licensed area represents a 1.8 x 1.8km geographic cell in a pre-defined grid that covers all of Australia.
BAI’s sister company, Boldyn Networks (previously BAI Communications in the Northern Hemisphere) already operates over 50 private mobile networks in Europe and BAI believes private 5G networks have reached an inflection point, with ports and transport hubs all showing interest. BAI Communications CTO Stephen Farrugia – who is a keynote speaker at Interconnect World Melbourne 2025 on April 3rd, 2025 – sat down with W.Media to explain how the company views private 5G, what it is planning to do with the spectrum it won and why Boldyn’s experience matters to BAI’s approach to 5G in Australia.
W.Media: We are in the reality phase for 5G with operators concerned more about monetising their investments rather than talking up things like remote surgery. And yet, private mobile networks are emerging as a real innovation space for telecoms. Given Boldyn/BAI’s presence in the space, what innovation are you seeing?
Stephen Farrugia: From an MNO perspective, with the wider adoption of 5G stand alone, we are seeing the ability to provide network slicing for private networks which allows the MNO to dedicate capacity from their public network to various private applications. The use of network APIs here will allow MNO customers to dynamically tailor these network slices for capacity and latency, among other things. We still see a need for dedicated networks – as the MNO network slicing still needs to operate within the limits of a shared public network – for some enterprises where service level guarantees, data ownership, security and autonomy are important. Internationally, our sister company Boldyn is seeing this desire for dedicated networks being played out in ports, mines, rail, chemical industry, agri-business and offshore wind farms.
W.Media: Where is the real action in private 5G – is it through licensed or unlicensed spectrum and what are the pros/cons of each approach?
Stephen Farrugia: For non-MNOs, access to spectrum for these dedicated networks is different in each country with shared spectrum available in the US, campus spectrum available on demand throughout much of Europe and in Australia a need to purchase spectrum up-front in high demand areas such as metropolitan and large regional areas. For MNOs, it will be through their licensed spectrum which can be a differentiator for them.
W.Media: How difficult is it to make shared infrastructure business models work from a technological versus regulatory standpoint? Is the latter the hurdle that needs to be overcome?
Stephen Farrugia: Shared infrastructure models are becoming increasingly important given their investment efficiency. The challenges are in providing the customers visibility of the benefits, confidence in the organisation’s ability to deliver and flexibility in future options. BAI has been providing shared infrastructure solutions in the broadcast sector for decades. Here, our customers generate the content, arrange for delivery to either a central hub or to site and we provide the on-site infrastructure either through ownership or commercial agreements. Our broadcast customers own the spectrum that is used. This is analogous to the mobile network arrangements where BAI could provide the In-building coverage solution or Radio Access Network, and the MNOs retain ownership of the spectrum through a MORAN or MOCN arrangement depending on their requirements. Alternatively, depending on the location, BAI could license and provide spectrum for the MNOs to access as part of the arrangement. As a telecommunications carrier, BAI doesn’t see any regulatory or technological issues that need to be overcome, it is about demonstrating the efficiency of the approach and addressing the MNO’s concerns about performance and flexibility.
W.Media: At MWC, there was a lot of talk about AI at the edge with inference being done there for industrial applications. What is your view on how this may develop?
Stephen Farrugia: Whether it be at the edge or in the distant cloud, AI will be a part of all networks and applications in the coming years. The decision on where to place the AI will largely depend on the use case, autonomy and security considerations. A few years ago, BAI worked with AMPC and Bondi Labs on a 5G trial which used a local AI system to visually identify packaged cuts of meat to allow confirmation of correct labelling. The use of edge compute was appropriate here given the customer’s desire to keep all data on-site, it was a moderate compute capability requirement and low latency was valuable. Nokia has conducted a demonstration working with the University of Technology Sydney to take all processing off an industrial robot to reduce battery consumption. In this case, low latency and reliability moved the decision towards local AI deployment. When considering optimising large mobile networks for both user experience and power consumption AI may be best deployed in the cloud as the latency does not have to be milliseconds and the larger processing capability of the cloud likely provides a better return on investment.
W.Media: As a global player, how applicable are the technology solutions/lessons you gain in one geographic market applicable to other geographic markets?
Stephen Farrugia: We benefit from our sister company Boldyn’s experience in deploying private networks as well as our own trials and we have regular information sharing sessions. The underlying technology of network core and Radio Access Network are largely transferrable (with some local spectrum tailoring) and the use cases are very similar. For example, the ports use cases being deployed at the Ports of Kokkola (Finland) and Blyth (UK) are directly applicable to address the issues faced by Australian ports. Horizontal use cases such as safety, risk management and governance are applicable across geographies and industry verticals.
W.Media: You have 3.8 GHz for private 5G in Australia – what are you planning to do with it?
Stephen Farrugia: In more remote parts of Australia, spectrum is available on an as required basis, so our focus has been acquiring spectrum in selected metropolitan and regional areas whilst it is available. We have selected a range of industry verticals including ports, logistics centres, health care facilities and manufacturing facilities where we believe these businesses would benefit from the use of 5G private networks and acquired spectrum in these localities to support the deployment. Within industry verticals, there are a range of preferred ICT managed service providers. We see our 5G offering as complementary to the services currently provided by these organisations and are working with a range of these providers to offer private network solutions to their customers. Multi-tenant private networks are also on our roadmap. In this scenario we would provide precinct-wide coverage to say a logistics hub and then each enterprise can have their dedicated and tailored solution within this precinct.
W.Media: What network/broadcast technologies are exciting you the most and why?
Stephen Farrugia: 5G, whether that be an MNO network slice or a private network, in conjunction with appropriately deployed AI has the ability to change the cost dynamics for Australian industries. Working with industries to unlock these improvements is extremely exciting as it has the potential to improve the work and safety of Australians.
[1] https://www.3gpp.org/component/content/article/6gworkshop-2025?catid=67&Itemid=101
BAI Communications CTO Stephen Farrugia will present a keynote: “AI, IoT & other Digital Technologies: Reshaping Connectivity as we currently know it?” at Interconnect World Melbourne at 11:50 am on 3 April, 2025 at Centrepiece, Melbourne Park. Interconnect World Melbourne 2025, which is colocated with the Melbourne Cloud and Datacenter Convention which takes place also on 3 April 2025, will bring the unique focus established by Interconnect World through 2024 across Asia and Australia to the Victorian market. Interconnect World Melbourne will focus on future trends and directions as they relate to the key commercial, technological and operational decisions that will shape the future of the telco ecosystem. This exclusive event will bring together the industry’s leading telcos, ISPs, IXs, TMT investors, government agencies along with key decision makers from enterprise customers of telco services and equipment.
For more information on Melbourne Interconnect World visit: https://interconnectworld.com/events/melbourne-interconnect-world-2025/
