At the University of British Columbia (UBC), the wireless network spans 100 hectares with multiple campuses — and it continues to grow to support more than 55,000 students, professors and staff for learning and research.
Like most major universities, UBC relies on technology to help it deliver educational services to its students and keep its faculty on the cutting edge of research and development. When UBC needed a solution that would scale with its growth and allow mobile workspaces anywhere on campus, it turned to Cisco.
“Cisco’s new technologies allow for a faster connection and increased density for lecture theatres that hold hundreds of students, allowing them to simultaneously use throughput-intensive course materials such as streaming media,” said Marilyn Hay, manager of the University of British Columbia’s Network Management Centre.
“These new technologies from Cisco create a truly mobile and collaborative environment for learning and research, helping to maintain UBC’s position as one of the top 35 research-intensive universities in the world.”
Collaboration in Motion
The new Cisco technologies Hay is referring to are part of the Collaboration in Motion initiative. The new initiative draws from products and services from the Cisco WebEx, Cisco Unified Communications, Cisco Unified Wireless Network and Cisco Advanced Services product lines to drive collaboration in the mobile workspace.
Cisco has invested in new products and services in five areas: the workspace experience, the wireless network platform, third-party applications, technology partners and professional services. Cisco’s goal is to bridge the gaps between an on-premises wired network, off-premises cellular network and a high performance Wi-Fi network so workers can work from anywhere.
“Cisco’s approach with Collaboration in Motion harnesses the power of the network to connect the devices to the network, to people and to systems, to collaborate in a borderless organization,” said Ray Smets, vice president and general manager for the Cisco Wireless…