LoRaWAN Gateway Strategy: Private vs. Public Network

Choosing between a Private and a Public LoRaWAN network is the single biggest architectural decision an enterprise will make. It dictates your costs, your security, and your reliance on third parties. This guide explains the difference: Public networks operate like a cellular plan (subscription-based), while Private networks operate like Wi-Fi (infrastructure-owned). We analyze why industrial users predominantly choose the Private model, deploying their own LoRaWAN gateway fleets to ensure guaranteed coverage, deep indoor penetration, and total data sovereignty.

When you decide to deploy IoT sensors, you face a fork in the road. Do you piggyback on an existing network, or do you build your own?

In the cellular world, you have no choice; you must pay Verizon or Vodafone. But LoRaWAN is different. It operates on unlicensed spectrum. This means you have the legal right to become your own telecom operator.

This freedom creates two distinct deployment models: Public and Private.

For industrial users, the choice often comes down to one question: Who owns the LoRaWAN gateway? This guide breaks down the pros, cons, and economics of each approach to help you decide.

In a Public LoRaWAN network (like The Things Network, Helium, or a national telecom operator), the infrastructure belongs to someone else.

• How it works: You buy sensors and register them to the provider. The provider manages the LoRaWAN gateway fleet spread across the city.
• The Role of the Gateway: You do not own the gateway. You hope that a gateway is close enough to your sensor to hear it.
• Best For: Smart City projects, logistics tracking across wide geographic areas, or small pilots where installing hardware is impossible.
• The Risk: If the provider changes their pricing, goes bankrupt, or simply has a "dead zone" in your basement, you are helpless. You cannot just move their LoRaWAN gateway to fix the signal.

In a Private LoRaWAN network, you own the entire stack. This is the preferred choice for factories, farms, and mines.

• How it works: You purchase your own LoRaWAN gateway (like the Robustel R3000 LG). You install it exactly where you need coverage. You run the Network Server yourself (or use a dedicated cloud instance).
• The Role of the Gateway: The LoRaWAN gateway is the anchor of your system. You place it high on a tower for range or deep in a warehouse for penetration.
• Best For: Industrial automation, building management, agriculture, and any application requiring 100% reliability.

Let's analyze why an enterprise would choose to buy a LoRaWAN gateway rather than rent connectivity.

In a factory, you need signals inside metal cabinets and underground tunnels. A public network tower 2km away cannot penetrate these obstacles. By deploying a private LoRaWAN gateway on-site, you guarantee signal strength. If you find a dead spot, you simply add another gateway. You control the reliability.

In a public network, your sensor data passes through the operator's infrastructure before reaching you. In a private network, the data goes from the Sensor -> Your LoRaWAN gateway -> Your Server. For sensitive industries (nuclear, defense, pharma), this "data sovereignty" is non-negotiable. Using a gateway with an Embedded LNS (Network Server) keeps traffic completely local, never touching the cloud.

• Public: Low upfront cost (no gateway to buy), but perpetual monthly subscription fees per sensor. As you scale to 1,000 sensors, these fees explode.
• Private: Higher upfront cost (buying the LoRaWAN gateway), but zero monthly fees per sensor. Once you own the infrastructure, adding the 1,001st sensor is free.

There is a middle ground. Platforms like The Things Network (TTN) or Helium allow you to buy your own LoRaWAN gateway and connect it to their public backend.

• Benefit: You improve coverage at your specific location by adding a gateway.
• Trade-off: You are sharing your gateway's capacity with the public. Other people's sensors can use your bandwidth. This is popular for smart cities but less common for mission-critical industry, where you want exclusive use of your LoRaWAN gateway bandwidth.

While public networks are convenient for roaming, the industrial world demands certainty. You cannot explain to a plant manager that the valve didn't close because a telecom operator had a network outage.

By deploying your own private LoRaWAN gateway, you take control of your destiny. You ensure coverage where you need it, secure your data behind your firewall, and cap your long-term operational costs. For the enterprise, private is usually the path to profit.