South African Internet Service Provider, Afrihost, has selected Ruckus Wireless as its Wi-Fi technology of choice for the company’s internal wireless requirements at the head office in Rivonia.

Brendan Armstrong, chief technology officer at Afrihost, commented: “As a service provider we understand the importance of uptime and customer satisfaction—and for our staff, this is no different. As such, we applied the same high level of expectation to our own wireless provider as our customers place on us, where connectivity in and around our office is paramount to efficiency, operations and productivity.”

Afrihost had become frustrated with its Wi-Fi installation as the technical equipment lacked the signal strength to deal with the environmental challenges and provide the coverage required for staff. Armstrong added: “We were looking for a provider who would offer a solution that not only combined smart meshing, dynamic user security, adaptive RF signal routing and centralised management – but very importantly a secure, scalable and simple-to-use platform.”

Ruckus Wireless, along with distribution partner Rodmark SA, were called in to advise on how to improve the wireless network and solve Afrihost’s connectivity challenges. Afrihost was asking Ruckus to take devices using the network into consideration to ensure that connectivity would be constant and consistent. Afrihost also requested that outdoor coverage be made available for guests and staff.

Bruce Pitso, regional manager for Ruckus Wireless South Africa, said: “Our team came in to survey the building. Then we used the floor plans and the requirements they provided to design a network that used more than half the number of access points (APs), yet still provided blanket carrier-grade coverage throughout the building.” 

“After the design, we came up with a count of 13 Ruckus ZoneFlex R500 APs in a building where there were previously 40 competitor APs installed,” said Xavier Ohn, founder and CEO of Rodmark SA.

Following the installation, signal strength, reliability, security and performance perfectly met all of Afrihost’s predefined goals. Armstrong stated: “I was impressed with the detailed documentation provided by Ruckus on the solution’s implementation and the general documentation compiled for our IT department to easily continue to manage the solution on an ongoing basis.”

An additional benefit for the executive team was that the overall project budget of the installation came in at 30% of the cost of the previous network.

“When it comes to Wi-Fi, enterprise users are sick and tired of unstable connections, dropped packets and erratic performance. They want a smarter wireless LAN (WLAN) system that provides solid coverage, capacity and reliability—but at the same time, one that is affordable and easier to deploy and manage. We are pleased we were able to provide Afrihost with exactly the high-performance solution it required,” concluded Pitso.