George Bush Intercontinental (IAH) and William
P. Hobby Airport (HOU) Offer Customers Reliable Wireless Experience
with Aruba Networks 802.11ac Infrastructure
Aruba Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARUN) today announced that the
Houston Airport System (HAS) has deployed Aruba’s 802.11ac solution
to enable free Wi-Fi service to customers and guests in its two
public passenger airports. With the new infrastructure, all
terminal areas of the William P. Hobby Airport, and George Bush
Intercontinental Airport, are now delivering fast, reliable Wi-Fi
services to airport customers. In addition, HAS plans to extend the
free Wi-Fi service to all indoor and outdoor areas of the two
airports by March 2015.
HAS had previously deployed a private Aruba wireless network for
internal use by employees and staff, and upgrading this network
coincided with the need to upgrade the public Wi-Fi network for the
two airports. HAS was pleased with the performance, reliability and
ease of management they experienced with the Aruba solutions used
on their private network, so according to Lisa Kent, CTO for HAS,
selecting Aruba’s 802.11ac solution for the public Wi-Fi network
was a straightforward decision.
“One of our strategic priorities is to serve the customer, and
although we had a previous public Wi-Fi service, it did not keep up
with expectations for quality, speed or even coverage, that
passengers in our airport facilities were demanding,” said Kent.
“Based on our experience with the private network, selecting Aruba
for the new public Wi-Fi network was an obvious choice.”
Given passenger expectations of increased speed and reliability,
the move to 802.11ac technology was a must for HAS. Using Aruba’s
200 Series 802.11ac indoor and 270 Series 802.11ac outdoor access
points, 7200 Series Mobility Controllers, AirWave Network
Management and ClearPass Access Management System for device
authentication, HAS is now offering service in 100 percent of the
interior, public spaces in the concourses and terminals including
baggage claim, ticket lobbies, check points, hold rooms and food
courts. Working with partner and professional services organization
Layer 3 Communications, HAS is in the process of extending coverage
to the aircraft ramps, curbside areas and parking garages.
“HAS was very quick to respond to its customers’ demands for
improved wireless connectivity, while ensuring that future
requirements can be addressed with the new, Gigabit Wi-Fi
infrastructure,” said Craig Wall, managing partner, Layer 3.
“Aruba’s 802.11ac solution was the ideal choice to address a public
Wi-Fi network of this size and with the kind of density of devices
common in airport environments.” Wall explained that with Aruba’s
ClientMatch™ technology, which continuously gathers session
performance metrics from mobile devices to steer each device to the
closest and best possible access point on the network, HAS can
handle the increased density of mobile devices in the airports and
ensure optimal performance and reliability for customers even as
they roam throughout the facilities.
Management of the network and the scores of users accessing it
every day was one of the key challenges HAS faced in expanding its
public Wi-Fi offerings across two large airports. According to
Kent, one of the benefits of Aruba AirWave is that it will not only
help HAS manage the network from an operational standpoint, but
will deliver valuable statistics about network users to help HAS
make marketing and business decisions about new service
offerings.
“Looking at the initial reports and quantity of data we can
obtain from AirWave, we’re very encouraged,” said Kent. “A key
benefit is being able to determine, by percentage, what types of
devices are accessing the network, because that helps drive where
we focus our efforts.”
According to Kent, passenger response to the new Wi-Fi network
has been extremely positive and uptake has been rapid with 21,000
mobile devices connecting to the network the Sunday after
Thanksgiving alone – despite the fact that HAS advertised the
network upgrade only minimally at that time. Kent said that the
moment HAS turned on the very first access point at Hobby Airport,
passengers began to connect immediately and send positive tweets
and comments of praise about the free Wi-Fi. “We intentionally have
a strong feedback mechanism so we can hear from our customers on a
variety of issues and Wi-Fi was a topic that kept emerging.
Customers wanted more robust Wi-Fi and now that we’ve addressed
their needs, they’re telling us how pleased they are,” she
added.
“The typical airport environment demands reliable, high-speed
connectivity and the two HAS airports are prime examples of this,”
said John Jankowski, area vice president for Aruba Networks.
“Passengers want to stay connected to their families, businesses
and friends when they travel. HAS recognized that a typical WLAN
network no longer meets their customer’s needs. Today’s WLAN must
be a fully enabled mobility network allowing customers the most
reliable, fast, and secure access in ultra-high-density
environments which directly results in increased customer
satisfaction.”
In the future, HAS is considering designing passenger mobile
apps and implementing location-based services and wayfinding for
customers to further enhance their travel experience.
“There are many things that passengers want to locate when
they’re inside an airport facility from retail stores and
restaurants to lost and found facilities and parking garages,” said
Kent. “We see the Wi-Fi platform as the critical foundation upon
which we’ll layer many of these additional applications and
services in the future.”
About Aruba Networks, Inc.
Aruba Networks is a leading provider of next-generation network
access solutions for the mobile enterprise. The company designs and
delivers Mobility-Defined Networks that empower IT departments and
#GenMobile, a new generation of tech-savvy users who rely on their
mobile devices for every aspect of work and personal communication.
To create a mobility experience that #GenMobile and IT can rely
upon, Aruba Mobility-Defined Networks™ automate infrastructure-wide
performance optimization and trigger security actions that used to
require manual IT intervention. The results are dramatically
improved productivity and lower operational costs.
Listed on the NASDAQ and Russell 2000® Index, Aruba is based in
Sunnyvale, California, and has operations throughout the Americas,
Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific regions. To learn
more, visit Aruba at http://www.arubanetworks.com. For real-time
news updates follow Aruba on Twitter and Facebook, and for the
latest technical discussions on mobility and Aruba products visit
Airheads Social at http://community.arubanetworks.com.
© 2015 Aruba Networks, Inc. Aruba Networks’ trademarks include
Aruba Networks®, Aruba The Mobile Edge Company® (stylized), Aruba
Mobility-Defined Networks™, Aruba Mobility Management System®,
People Move Networks Must Follow®, Mobile Edge Architecture®,
RFProtect®, Green Island®, ETips®, ClientMatchTM, Virtual Intranet
AccessTM, ClearPass Access Management SystemsTM, Aruba InstantTM,
ArubaOSTM, xSecTM, ServiceEdgeTM, Aruba ClearPass Access Management
SystemTM, AirmeshTM, AirWaveTM, Aruba CentralTM, and ARUBA@WORKTM.
All rights reserved. All other trademarks are the property of their
respective owners.
Aruba Networks, Inc.Pavel Radda, +1
408-419-0294Director of Corporate
Communicationspradda@arubanetworks.comorLSH Communications for
Aruba NetworksLori Hultin, +1
818-879-4651Principallhultin@arubanetworks.com