Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) is modernising its wireless networks to support 4,000 employees daily, using Aruba WLAN solutions that will provide comprehensive and flexible Wi-Fi coverage for the 150,000-square-meter SPH campus spanning both Print and News Centres.
The network modernisation will create operational efficiencies and bolster security across thousands of users and devices from a single management pane, providing full visibility into the network.
“The pandemic accelerated the agenda to strengthen our technological foundations, so we can improve work quality and streamline processes with an enhanced network infrastructure,” said Glen Francis, CTO of SPH. “Mobility and agility will be key driving forces in the evolving ‘anywhere’ office.”
Justin Chiah, Aruba’s senior director for Southeast Asia, Taiwan and Hong Kong, said that in the digital-first reality, new business outcomes and dynamic customer experiences are only possible if there is a secure, automated and intelligent network infrastructure supporting it.
Aruba AirWave was implemented to gain granular visibility into SPH’s ageing wired and wireless networks. Coupled with Aruba UXI sensors, user experience was closely monitored in real time, and effectively pinpointed the main sources of connectivity issues, such as that the 2.4Ghz channels were over utilised.
Once core pain points were identified and resolved, Aruba Access Points, Aruba Mobility Master and Aruba Controllers were rolled out on top of Aruba UXI sensors to further strengthen network coverage and performance at all corners of SPH premises and beyond.
On-premise roaming saw big improvements from previous coverage which was spotty at best, and Wi-Fi bandwidth provisions doubled from 64 to 128 Mbps.
Beyond improving staff experience, sensors deployed at home offices also allowed SPH to monitor actual subscriber experience while they accessed SPH digital content from home.
With thousands of digital endpoints connected to SPH’s network daily, Aruba ClearPass was selected as a single management tool that provided full visibility over the multitude of endpoints, and extended role-based access control with granular policies.
Maintaining the configuration within a single tool reduced the risk of making a configuration mistake compared to before, when various authentication servers were used for different types of endpoints.
