SAN JOSE, CA, Jan 30 (MARKET WIRE) --
Cisco(R) (NASDAQ: CSCO) announced today that Montreal's Concordia University
has added the next chapter to its history as one of Canada's leading technology
trailblazers by deploying the country's first 802.11n wireless network on a
university campus and incorporating it as part of a larger, innovative
indoor-outdoor wireless mobility infrastructure.
The adoption of Cisco's next-generation 802.11n wireless technology allows
Concordia University to expand its campus-wide wireless network. Part of the
Cisco Unified Wireless Network, the 802.11n solution offers improved reliability
and faster throughput for existing 802.11g implementations. The new 802.11n
network
represents the university's latest milestone in adopting cutting-edge
information technology from Cisco. Concordia University, which hosts about
40,000
students, deployed Canada's first wireless local-area network in 2001, and in
2003 it was the country's first higher-education institution to roll out Voice
over Internet Protocol (VoIP) across a wireless infrastructure. Today, Concordia
University is enhancing its indoor wireless network with Wi-Fi-certified
802.11nAironet(R) 1250 Series Access Points from Cisco and managing a
first-of-its-kind service-oriented outdoor mesh network that offers mobile phone
and data storage services. Although they are two distinct initiatives, together
they strengthen the school's ability to provide reliable wireless performance
and
innovative mobile services to students and staff.
For instance, the university acts as a telecommunications service provider
to the
campus community. Although accessing the indoor 802.11n network is free, the
university charges subscribers a monthly rate of CAN $8.99 for outdoor
connections. Concordia is already working on a plan that will allow students
who are physically on campus to seamlessly offload calls from their mobile
provider's network, allowing them to avoid burning minutes from their mobile
phone plans. This transition between the campus and mobile carriers'
networks, various mobile applications and mobile devices (called seamless mobile
collaboration, or SMC) represents a novel approach to supporting everything from
general student communications and ubiquitous connectivity to campus operations
and
emergency preparedness.
In addition to being a service provider for wireless mobile
telecommunications,
Concordia University allows students and staff to subscribe to virtualized
desktops, which minimizes software and hardware replacement costs as well as the
number of potential attack vectors that viruses and other security threats can
exploit. The IT team stores data for subscribers and provides necessary
applications on demand.
"Our IT organization serves as a service provider, a storage provider, a
software provider, and more," said Andrew McAusland, associate vice president
of Instructional and Information Technology Services at Concordia University.
"We
make a conscientious effort to provide our students with advanced services.
This represents a significant part of our vision and commitment to all
Concordians. Our work with Cisco, particularly the combination of 802.11n
wireless networking, VoIP over WLAN, outdoor mesh and seamless mobile
collaboration technologies, brings this vision to life."
All of these services represent industry firsts within Canada's education
community. Concordia University's penchant for deploying first-of-its-kind
technology
parallels Cisco's recent innovation in the wireless mobility arena, particularly
in the area of outdoor mesh and 802.11n. Cisco is the first vendor to ship
802.11n products globally, and entering 2008 it was the only vendor
delivering actual products to the marketplace. According to the latest
market-share reports from Dell'Oro and Synergy, Cisco commands 64 percent of the
wireless local-area network (WLAN) space, seven times its nearest
competitor's share. Gartner's Wireless LAN Infrastructure Magic Quadrant,
released December 20, 2007, pegs Cisco as an industry leader as well.
McAusland said Cisco's history of leadership in the wireless networking
andIT space fuels his confidence to adopt new-age technology.
"Anytime you become an early adopter, the integrity of a vendor's track
record
in a particular technology space, as well as the investment protection provided
by
that technology, is absolutely critical," McAusland said. "With 802.11n, Cisco
meets those requirements. They were there when we deployed our first WLAN,
when we rolled out VoIP over that WLAN, when we established an outdoor mesh
network. And now they are helping us be the vanguard for 802.11n within our
country's education community. Our 802.11n deployment is live and operational as
we speak. Using Cisco's latest offerings give us a differentiable advantage that
pays off for our campus community."
Shipped this fall, Cisco's Aironet 1250 Series Access Points are the
industry's first Wi-Fi-certified 802.11n draft 2.0 access points and first
commercially available product to have participated in the Wi-Fi Alliance
802.11n
draft 2.0 testbed. In addition to the increase in throughput, McAusland said
Cisco's
multiple-in, multiple-out (MIMO) technology helps his team achieve backward
compatibility with older b- and g-based access points to provide highly reliable
wireless coverage, particularly for challenging radio frequency environments
within the university's environs.
"There have been a lot of claims and speculation about prospective 802.11n
deployments, but Concordia University's live 802.11n network is showing that
actions speak louder than words," said Ben Gibson, Cisco's senior director of
mobility solutions. "While 802.11n represents a significant wave of the future,
the
university knows that 802.11n is not the beginning and end of its innovative
scope.
The university realizes that the sum is greater than its parts. Concordia
University is showing the higher education and broader business community a
successful model for weaving 802.11n into the fabric of a larger, comprehensive
indoor-outdoor mobility infrastructure."
About Cisco
Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the worldwide leader in networking that transforms
how
people connect, communicate and collaborate. Information about Cisco can be
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Cisco Systems, Inc.
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nebecker@cisco.com
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Cisco Systems, Inc.
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