Broadband  |  2025-09-12

Europe’s Largest Private 5G Network Now Operational in the French Alps

Curated by: Gert Jan Wolf - Editor-in Chief for The Critical Communications Review

A landmark project has been completed in the French Alps: SmartMountain5G, now Europe’s largest private 5G network by coverage, has gone live across more than 150 square kilometres of some of the most challenging terrain in Europe. Developed under the leadership of Numerisat and powered by Firecell’s full private 5G stack, the network delivers production-grade connectivity for energy, safety, agriculture and tourism use cases in Haute Maurienne valley.

The deployment features twelve 5G cell sites located between 1,200 and 2,300 metres above sea level, linked via satellite (LEO and GEO) backhaul and supported by edge computing capabilities.

With this infrastructure, the system ensures real-time alerting, remote monitoring, predictive maintenance, and autonomous environmental safety operations—vital in a region where legacy radio links have failed under severe weather and terrain conditions.

Firecell is responsible for supplying both the hardware and software of the network, including radio performance, core network integration, and secure edge computing.

The project brings into service stakeholders such as local municipalities (Val Cenis, Bessans, Aussois), public service providers, farmer associations, tourism operators, and safety organisations. Use cases include precision monitoring of hydropower stations, sensor-based avalanche detection, AI-analysed environmental data, smart agriculture and emergency services communications.

According to Didier Flaender, President of Numerisat,

We’re connecting places that were off the grid until now. The network’s hybrid architecture—small-cells combined with satellites and edge compute—tinuity of service even in remote locations and under adverse conditions.

SmartMountain5G has been publicly funded through the Connecting Europe Facility’s Smart Communities and Edge Computing programme. It stands as a model for private 5G deployments in mountainous and difficult-coverage regions, offering both resilience and high performance.