Hi Daniella, I'm happy to chime in here. I have some thoughts below, but it all boils down to how large is your company, how much if any dedicated GIS staff do you have, and how experienced is that GIS staff at maintaining Enterprise with Portal and maintaining very clean datasets that require a lot of AsBuild time in the office.
The Utility Network Model is very robust and is usable on its own, but really shines when third party companies like Schneider, mPower, 3GIS, CrescentLink, and many others build additional tools like splice editor GUIs, etc. on top of it. That does of course add additional costs though. However, because it is so complex there is a lot of data entry and management that has to be maintained at the AsBuild level to keep the information clean and the model running well.
It usually comes down to a company's size and dedicated GIS workforce on deciding whether it is worth it to use Utility Network. It runs on Enterprise, and I think Portal only still, which are additional software/hardware that need to be maintained or farmed out to someone to maintain for you. ESRI does have a cloud solution they can help with that on.
I work mostly with small rural telecom cooperatives in the midwest and for most of them the Utility Network on Enterprise is not the right solution. To complex of data entry, can't maintain their AsBuilds from the field with Field Maps (most of them are too small to have a dedicated GIS staff person), and most of them can only afford hosting and operating out of ArcGIS Online instead of Enterprise. On the other hand, some of my clients are medium sized telecoms with dedicated GIS staff and they love the utility network with a 3rd party company's add-on.
If you are in this camp of a smaller telecom company, then I'd suggest ESRI's Communications Data Management model https://arcg.is/18SC4K It is similarly structured and will setup a bunch of initial maps, apps, survey's etc. for you. You will still need to update domain lists, symbology, etc. to your company's needs. However, you won't need Enterpirse, it can be hosted on ArcGIS Online only, and since it isn't truly a Utility Network, with traces, splice connections, etc. you can AsBuild directly from the field with Field Maps if needed because you don't have dedicated GIS staff.
Any other questions I'm happy to help. The ESRI telecom staff are really amazing though and will help guide customers down the telecom GIS path that is the right fit for each company and not just try to upsell you on a solution that isn't right for you just for sales. So don't be afraid to reach out to them directly as well.
Best regards,
Clayton
