SUNNYVALE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aruba Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARUN), today announced a new software release for its wireless LANs (WLANs) that helps enterprises ensure consistent, predictable performance and fast recovery for today’s challenging mobile environments.
The new ArubaOS 6.1.3.4 for Aruba mobility controllers addresses a key issue for enterprises: how to ensure high performance and minimum downtime for large-scale mobility networks that must accommodate a growing number of mobile devices and real-time mobile applications such as voice and video.
As the number of mobile devices on the network increases, less bandwidth is available. The result is unpredictable bandwidth allocation for individual clients, dropped Wi-Fi connections and failure of data transfers. With Aruba’s approach to airtime fairness and the new ArubaOS, no single group of clients can monopolize network resources over another. In fact, competitive testing results using a variety of client devices including smartphones, tablets and laptops in different quantities and configurations, showed that Aruba’s WLAN delivered up to four times better performance than a Cisco WLAN. Full test results, including the complete test methodology, are available here.
In addition to performance, a key concern for enterprises as they expand their mobility networks is rapid recovery in the event of network failure. With traditional wireless LAN solutions, it can take up to 60 seconds for a single access point to recover, resulting in downtime for network users and higher maintenance costs for the enterprise. With this latest software release, Aruba’s WLAN can ensure recovery up to seven times faster than Cisco WLANs – so quick that even video conference calls stay connected in the event of a failure.
Unlike competing solutions that focus solely on the resiliency of controllers and access points, Aruba ensures that clients and applications such as Microsoft Lync, Apple FaceTime, unicast and multicast video continue to perform flawlessly and without interruption. For example, Aruba’s wireless LAN – the first to achieve Wi-Fi qualification for Microsoft Lync Server – automatically identifies, prioritizes and protects Unified Communications (UC) applications in the presence of Wi-Fi congestion, resulting in up to 75% better quality for these applications.
Regional Medical Center at Memphis (The MED) is a regional healthcare resource that has benefited from Aruba’s approach to wireless LAN resiliency. The MED includes a large hospital and four clinics serving a five-state region within 150 miles of Memphis, and also serves as one of the largest medical and surgical teaching sites for the University of Tennessee Health Science Center. With over 2,200 employees, including 500 nurses and 200 doctors, The MED relies on its Aruba WLAN to provide quality patient care around the clock.
“Our medical staff has an expectation of always-on wireless and always-available access to critical patient information,” said Tony Alphier, Director of IT, Regional Medical Center at Memphis (The MED). “As we continue to increase the number of users, real-time applications and mobile devices such as our Bedside Mobile Workstations (BMWs) on the network, it becomes even more important to ensure the redundancy and resiliency of our wireless network infrastructure. Aruba’s approach to high availability was a key factor in choosing its WLAN to replace our existing Cisco wireless infrastructure. With Aruba, we have virtually eliminated our network downtime and the high cost and drain on IT resources that accompany it.”
“Aruba recognizes that the most important measure of WLAN resiliency is uninterrupted access to clients and applications,” said Keerti Melkote, Chief Technology Officer for Aruba Networks. “Today’s mobility networks must accommodate the huge influx of mobile devices on the network, as well as the real-time voice and video applications that are now part of most users’ daily interactions. With this new software and our existing wireless LAN portfolio, Aruba is helping enterprises meet these challenges, providing a level of performance and resiliency that, as testing demonstrates, other wireless LAN vendors cannot match.”
ArubaOS 6.1.3.4 for Aruba mobility controllers is available now as a free software download to existing Aruba WLAN customers. Aruba will host a webinar at 10:00am PST on Thursday, September 20th, to provide additional information on the new software and test results. To register for the webinar, please visit http://page.arubanetworks.com/HA.html. Complete competitive test results can be downloaded from http://www.arubanetworks.com/performance.
About Aruba Networks, Inc.
Aruba Networks is a leading provider of next-generation network access solutions for the mobile enterprise. The company’s Mobile Virtual Enterprise (MOVE) architecture unifies wired and wireless network infrastructures into one seamless access solution for corporate headquarters, mobile business professionals, remote workers and guests. This unified approach to access networks enables IT organizations and users to securely address the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) phenomenon, dramatically improving productivity and lowering capital and operational costs.
Listed on the NASDAQ and Russell 2000® Index, Aruba is based in Sunnyvale, California, and has operations throughout the Americas, Europe, Middle East and Asia Pacific regions. To learn more, visit Aruba at http://www.arubanetworks.com. For real-time news updates follow Aruba on Twitter and Facebook, and for the latest technical discussions on mobility and Aruba products visit Airheads Social at http://community.arubanetworks.com.
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