Cisco Lab Demonstrates State-of-the-Art Wireless Business Applications

November 12, 2003

By Charles Waltner, News@Cisco

Cisco Systems is providing a glimpse into the future of wireless networking by putting on display what it is doing today.

The Cisco Wireless Integrated Network Solutions (WINS) Lab at the company's main campus in San Jose, Calif., offers visitors an interactive, first-hand experience with some of the most innovative wireless applications currently used by organizations around the world. The applications in the lab include software and hardware created by Cisco's ecosystem of more than 70 partners. All the applications are connected using Cisco's full portfolio of Aironet wireless networking products, including access points, client cards, bridges, and networking software. Demonstrations at the Lab cover a wide-range of applications designed for specific industries, including healthcare, retail, education, transportation, public services, as well as corporate applications and wireless bridging technologies. Most importantly, the WINS Lab definitively illustrates how wireless applications have evolved from niche products to core network elements.

Corporate budgets are tight, yet the market for wireless LANs is expanding. The WINS Lab provides the hands-on reasons why. At the Lab, visitors can use a wireless barcode scanner equipped with a digital camera to take pictures of damaged goods for expediting inventory management. Or they can ride a bus and see how wireless hot spots are giving passengers up-to-minute route information, complete with maps displayed from on-board monitors. Or they can view the array of wireless tools helping doctors and nurses collect, access and distribute information in real-time from patient bedsides. Or they can see how police officers are using the revolutionary Cisco Mobile Access Router to send and receive crucial crime information on-the-go from their vehicles. Visitors can even test out the Cisco wireless IP Phone 7920, which serves as a mobile office phone anywhere within a wireless LAN.

Making this all possible is the Cisco Aironet family of wireless networking products. More than just a collection of wireless access points, bridges, adapters, and accessories, the Cisco Aironet family reflects Cisco's end-to-end approach to networking, helping companies seamlessly tie their wireless applications to their wired networks through integrated intelligence and enterprise-class services, with the performance, scalability, manageability and security of wired networks.

The Cisco Structured Wireless-Aware Network (SWAN) is also demonstrated at the WINS Lab. Cisco SWAN is a secure, integrated wireless LAN solution of Cisco wireless-aware infrastructure products designed to minimize total cost of ownership through optimized deployment and management of multi-function access points. Cisco SWAN extends to the wireless LAN the same level of security, scalability, and reliability that customers have come to expect in their wired networks.

Cisco Aironet products also offer an array of other industry-leading features. Cisco customers, for example, benefit from the "future-proofed" modular design of Cisco Aironet access points, offering high-speed Wi-Fi network connections at 54 Mbps and greater upgrade potential and investment protection. Cisco also offers its Cisco Wireless Security Suite, the strongest level of wireless security available. And Cisco's wireless products all use open standards for the most interoperable products possible.

Such features and support have lead Cisco to an industry-leading 32 percent share of the wireless LAN infrastructure market, according to a study by the Dell'Oro Group. Cisco wireless LAN customers include some of the most distinguished organizations in their industries, such as Longs Drugs, Sydney Airport, Major League Baseball, EDS, London Business School, and John Hopkins University.

The ecosystem of Cisco partners includes some of the most respected names in the business, including Intel, Hewlett-Packard Company, Siemens, and Intermec. By partnering with these companies, Cisco is bringing eye-raising productivity benefits to businesses and other organizations. According to a recent study by the NOP World Technology research agency, the convenience of wireless contributed to a time-savings of 80 minutes a day for each employee, making employees 21 percent more productive. Also, according to the survey, the increase in wireless deployments, plus the additional time savings, resulted in a value of time saved, per employee, to almost $14,000 annually.

There are also additional intangible business benefits of being able to create applications that would never have been possible without wireless technology, such as the Cisco wireless IP phone or a mobile warehouse inventory management tool.

A visit to the Cisco WINS Lab will help anyone with doubts realize that wireless networking is no longer just an interesting idea, but a necessary business reality. Some of the industry's most prominent information technology professionals realize wireless networking, and the productivity-boosting applications it makes possible, are now a required investment for business success.

"I compare it to 20 years ago, when PCs were first coming out, and there was a lot of reluctance about whether or not PCs were viable," says Tony Scott, chief technology officer with General Motors. "It took many years for us to change, and I'm not going to let that same thing happen with wireless networking."

Charles Waltner is a freelance journalist based in Oakland, CA.