Verizon Communications Inc. subsidiary Verizon Business said today it’s teaming up with the professional services consultancy Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd. to offer 5G and mobile edge computing services to the manufacturing and retail industries.

The plan is to combine Verizon’s mobile and private wireless networks and 5G Edge Multi-Access Edge Computing platform and its software-defined wide-area network capabilities with Deloitte’s engineering expertise, the companies said.

Under the partnership, the two companie are developing a smart factory solution for Verizon’s Customer Technology Center in Richardson, Texas. That system will use sensor-based detection paired with MEC to both identify and predict quality defects on assembly lines. The system will be able to send automatic alerts to engineering and management teams in real time.

Verizon and Deloitte will also use their combined resources to reduce the need for manual quality inspections in factories. They say the combination of Verizon’s SD-WAN and VNS Application Edge technologies will help manufacturers to improve productivity and reduce production waste.

“By bringing together Verizon’s 5G and MEC prowess with Deloitte’s deep industry expertise and track record in system integration with large enterprises on smart factories, we plan to deliver cutting-edge solutions that will close the gap between digital business operations and legacy manufacturing environments and unlock the value of the end-to-end digital enterprise,” said Tami Erwin, chief executive of Verizon Business. “This collaboration is part of Verizon’s broader strategy to align with enterprises, startups, universities and government to explore how 5G and MEC can disrupt and transform nearly every industry.”

Verizon sees two different revenue opportunities for its MEC platform, in private and public deployments. Private deployments are those in dedicated and confined areas such as factories, distribution centers and large retail stores, where businesses need to ensure high capacity and retain data securely on site. The collaboration with Deloitte falls into this category.

On the public side, Verizon is partnering with Amazon Web Services Inc., using the cloud company’s infrastructure to provide edge computing services for next-generation ultra-low-latency mobile applications.

The companies currently have eight AWS Wavelength Zones up and running in the U.S., with plans to add two more before the end of the year. The AWS Wavelength service combines Amazon’s compute and storage services with Verizon’s 5G mobile networks at the edge, giving companies access to cloud infrastructure with less network hops involved than when they connect to Amazon’s traditional availability zones.

Image: Verizon