Case Study: Designing a Small Cells Network of a Large Hotel 70 percent Faster

In this blog I’ll take a look at a recent project done by one of our customers to design a small cells network for a large business complex hotel located in Asia. By using iBwave, and in particular the collaboration capabilities our solutions provide, our customer was able to expedite the project time by 70% while meeting all the key performance indicators.

Here we go.

What was the venue?

5 Star Business Hotel
600,000 sq. ft
14 floors
437 rooms

How many users are we talking?

On average there are 1,500 to 4,000 users accessing the network with their mobile devices for an average 3 hours per day.

What technologies were they designing for?

This project was a small cells project, using both the cellular and Wi-Fi technologies.

Great, what results were they achieved?

Key Performance Indicators were set as requirements before the project began for both cellular and Wi-Fi performance.

3 Mb/s per user
RSRP -98 dBm > 95% area
Wi-Fi -65/70 dBm > 95% area

How did they use iBwave during the project?

For this project the powerful combination of:

iBwave Mobile Planner (mobile app to gather site survey measurements, images, notes and do a preliminary design)
iBwave Design (power PC software to design both cellular and Wi-Fi networks)
iBwave Unity (cloud-based site and project management software accessible via the web)

were all used in different phases of the project, by different teams of people. The key to this project was how they utilized the cloud-connected iBwave Unity site management software in order to keep all of their site and project documentation synchronized and up-to-date throughout the project.

How they used each project and when can be summarized by something like this:

Let me break this graphic down further.

To start the project, field technicians completed a site survey using iBwave Mobile Planner (a Wi-Fi/Small Cells site survey and design app) , to document the site (measurements, images, notes) and do a preliminary design while there on-site at the hotel. Once the site survey information had been gathered, the field technicians saved that project to the cloud where it could be immediately opened and accessed by engineers back at the offices in the powerful PC based network planning and design software, iBwave Design. Once the file was open, the engineers had all the site survey information right there on the floor plan with all the images and notes captured by the field team. In this case the customer was using iBwave Unity, our enhanced version of the cloud which also acts as a site management tool instead of the basic cloud that comes with only 10GB and no site management functionality. Why iBwave Unity? Because this customer does so many projects a year, iBwave Unity gives them a way to gain insight and control over all the sites and projects they do – including dashboards, reporting, workflow management and compliance checking.

Once the design was completed in iBwave Design, field technicians or engineers validated the network using iBwave Mobile Planner, to ensure network design requirements were met and no issues required further troubleshooting.

What were the design results?

390

SMALL CELL ACCESS POINTS

17KM

OF CABLING

What reports did they use?

There were 7 key reports generated throughout the project

Equipment List (Bill of Materials)
Output Maps
Cable Routing
Cost Details
Annotation
KPI Compliance
Capacity

Here are some pictures!

So, how long did all of that take to do?

Using the combination of iBwave Mobile Planner, iBwave Design and the cloud-connected iBwave Unity, the project was completed in….

3 DAYS

1 SITE VISIT

That is 70% faster than it would usually take them to complete the same project (about 10 days, 3-4 site visits).

Check out also our eBook about Wi-Fi Challenges and Best Practices in Hospitality written with the help of the industry expert Ronald van Kleunen. We’ve included a detachable customer requirements checklist in the book, take it with you to the field and keep it handy!

And that is where I’ll wrap this blog up, thanks for reading!

Interested in trying out iBwave Mobile Planner for small cells and Wi-Fi site surveys and simple designs? Get a free trial!

How NCR Telecom & Technology Uses iBwave to Design Converged Networks in the Enterprise

What’s the Story?

NCR is a leader in omni-channel solutions, turning everyday interactions with businesses into exceptional experiences. With its software,hardware, and portfolio of services, NCR enables more than 650 million transactions daily across retail, financial, travel, hospitality, telecom and technology, and small business. Utilizing NCR’s team of 17,000 service professionals, NCR Telecom & Technology(T&T) provides comprehensive services solutions encompassing consulting, field services, and remote management to the top telecommunications service providers and network equipment manufacturers across the globe.

With a trend towards enterprise-funded Wi-Fi and Cellular networks built on common infrastructure components in the same venues, having a solution like iBwave maximizes the productivity of our design engineering and field workforce — Steven Strickland, Solution Management & Marketing, NCR Telecom & Technology

Each year, NCR Telecom and Technology:

Installs and manages over 100,000 wireless access points
Completes over 250,000 enterprise network deployments
Manages over 200,000 network end points
Executes 1.2M service actions

In order to design and deploy high-quality networks their customers can rely on, the NCR T&T division has chosen to use iBwave Design as their standard software to design multiple in-building wireless networks, including: DAS, Small Cells, Wi-Fi, Public Safety and cabling routes.Most recently, NCR has also invested in iBwave Wi-Fi for their professional services team to deploy a large amount of stand alone WLAN networks for their customers. In 2017 NCR T&T will have 17 certified iBwave Professionals.

NCR’s ability to standardize on one collaborative design platform is absolutely critical in delivering multi vendor wireless technologies to venue owners looking to keep pace with explosive mobile device growth. Our presales and professional services engineers are unmatched in their knowledge of enterprise networking and RF planning. It is my team’s inherent responsibility to equip our experts with the right tools to proficiently design in-building wireless networks and exchange information with our global field force in real-time. — Steven Strickland, Solution Management & Marketing, NCR Telecom & Technology

Why iBwave?

#1 THE ABILITY TO DESIGN CONVERGED NETWORKS

With iBwave Design, NCR is able to model and design multiple technology types (Cellular and Wi-Fi) in-building wireless networks from within a single solution.

#2 ACCURATE PREDICTIONS FOR ANY NETWORK TYPE

By using iBwave Design, NCR has the ability to accurately run project predictions for virtually any type of wireless network they are deploying.

#3 SITE SURVEY AUTOMATION & CLOUD COLLABORATION

With iBwave Mobile Note, NCR significiantly reduces the survey data import process by using the app as an all-in-one site survey tool (data collection, documentation, and design) and then save all site info to the iBwave cloud so it can be worked on by an engineer in another location.

The Benefits of Using iBwave

Using iBwave as their standard software for in-building network design, NCR has seen significant benefits, including:

20% Increase in Productivity
Increase in the Bill of Materials Accuracy
Increase in the Number of Deals Won
Decrease in the Time to Quote
Decrease in Time to Share Site Survey Data
Decrease in Time Spent on Project Co-ordination

Favourite iBwave Features

Here are a few of the features that the NCR T&T team has found the most valuable:

RF planning automation
Predictive mapping of cable routes and wireless access points
Automatic bill of materials and project costs
Wi-Fi & cellular design in one tool
3D Output Maps
Prediction validation against measured data

Recap-How to Design High Capacity Wi-Fi Networks

Andrew von Nagy, Wi-Fi Expert and Owner of Revolution Wi-Fi was the guest speaker at our very successful webinar on “Designing High Capacity Wi-Fi Network’s”. The webinar also featured a Demo of iBwave Wi-Fi’s Capacity Planning capabilities by Sr. Manager Technical Product Management Marc-Antoine Lamontagne. During the webinar we received a large number of questions from attendees, some of which Andrew and Marc-Antoine were was able to answer live. However, we did not have time to answer all of them. This week Marc Antoine and Vladan Jevremovic, Research Director, iBwave took some time to address some key questions asked during the webinar. Read on and let’s keep the discussion going.

1- Can you please explain the impact of deploying access points with dual 5GHz radios on the design of high capacity Wi-Fi Networks?

The first advantage of using dual 5GHz radio is to offer twice the capacity from the same access points. Since you have 2 radios running on different channels you end up with air interface available to support more users and higher throughput. This type of architecture is made possible because of the high number of non-overlapping channels available on the 5GHz band. The second advantage is to reduce the cost of the deployment for high-density environment. Since you have 2 radios in the same access point, you end up with more capacity and keep the number of access points to a minimum. You can also save on installation cost by reducing the number of cables to pull in the ceiling in order to connect all the access points. From a Design perspective, having more than one radio in the same AP will augment the number of channels being used in that location and will reduce the channels that you can use for the other APs. This will increase slightly the risk of co-channel interference (CCI) in your design and decrease the capacity available for each AP since they are sharing the same air interface. Therefore, it will be important, as you validate your network, to look at the CCI (number of access points using the same channel with overlapping coverage). This is done in iBwave Wi-Fi using the CCI map. Also, since you are increasing the density of the channel being used, it will increase the zone of transitions between APs. It will be important to look at the location of these zones to make sure they are not located in areas of high usage. This can be done in iBwave Design using the Best Channel output map.

APs with dual (or more) 5GHz radios are not yet supported out of the box with iBwave Wi-Fi. Anyhow, a simple workaround can be used by creating 2 APs with each one using a different channel. We then have a method in iBwave Design to keep the bill of material accurate. We are currently in discussion with some manufacturers to see how we could better model this type of equipment more seamlessly.

2- How 3G & LTE offloading can be implemented using Wi-Fi and how capacity has to be planned accordingly?

HetNet Capacity modeling combining 3G, 4G and Wi-Fi applications is supported with iBwave Design Enterprise. The application allows precise definition of the market share between cellular operators, technology split between 3G and 4G and finally the % of expected traffic between cellular and Wi-Fi. Based on this information, the application automatically allocates the traffic on the right network and calculates the expected load for each one. In iBwave Design, it is also possible to configure LTE services for voice over LTE and voice over Wi-Fi.

When VoLTE is selected, the traffic is automatically assigned to the 3G service for the same operator. If VoWiFi is selected, the traffic is assigned to the Wi-Fi network. This creates a complete HetNet model to validate the overall quality of experience for the users considering the offload to different network technologies. At the end, the application allows you to validate your KPIs of capacity for each network service and the expected throughput available in average for the users.

3- What main inputs are you considering for Capacity Analysis? And how it relates to the Equipment Capacity?

Equipment capacity is the maximum number of radios associated to an AP. This is specified by the manufacturer, and if the maximum number is reached, AP will decline further association requests. The manufacturer specifies this number based on their own hardware limitations. In our capacity algorithm, we calculate “airtime capacity”, as we look into files that need to be transmitted between AP and a radio. This is specified in our “user profile”, where we list applications that are likely to be used, and file size for each application. These files need to be transmitted over a user-defined period of time. The default is one hour, but it can be expressed in multiples of one hour. In our algorithm we calculate the actual air time required to transfer all files specified in a user profile, taking into account maximum throughput that each AP can achieve, which is based on radio conditions in the network (SNR, CCI, etc). We then multiply the required airtime for each user with a total number of users in AP coverage, to get the total air time needed to transmit all files for all users. Once the total required airtime reaches or exceeds the user-specified period of time, then the maximum number of users per AP has been reached, and no more users can be served with that AP. This is what we call “airtime capacity”.