Meraki and BT Get Thousands Online at Le Web 2009
63% of devices on network are Apple products
PARIS – December 11 ,2009 – Meraki, the cloud-based wireless networking company, today announced it has successfully completed large-scale Wi-Fi deployment at the Le Web 2009 conference in Paris. In partnership, BT and Meraki ran the conference’s Wi-Fi network which provided 2,500 users with a 1Gb/s internet service that consumed over 470GB of data in two days.
Once again proving Apple’s popularity, figures show that 63% of the devices on the network were Apple products (38% iPhone and 24% Mac laptops) compared to 23% Windows PC devices. The conference, widely regarded as the number one European event, attracts over 2500 technology experts from more than 50 different countries every year.
BT had overall responsibility for the network and infrastructure while Meraki provided 26 high-speed Meraki MR14 access points and the Meraki Enterprise Cloud Controller to manage the system. Gary Shainberg, VP at BT who led the network deployment said “For the past three years Le Web has not had the fast, reliable Wi-Fi that its high profile attendees demand. This year the conference organizers brought in BT to make absolutely certain that they had the connectivity they needed,”
“Providing high-quality Wi-Fi coverage for conferences is notoriously tricky,” said Hans Robertson, VP Product Management and Co-Founder, Meraki. “A large number of devices in a small space, limited setup and test time, and a demanding user base mean there’s little margin for error. Meraki products work well in this situation because they set up quickly and easily and provide a variety of real-time debugging tools to identify and correct problems.”
“The theme for Le Web 2009 was ‘The Real-Time Web’ and in order to deliver that, we needed to make sure everyone could get online,” said Loic LeMeur, LeWeb organizer. “People told us that the Wi-Fi network was one of the best they’d seen.”
About Meraki
Meraki offers enterprise-class wireless networks at a fraction of the cost and complexity of traditional networking vendors. This is made possible by its unique cloud-based technology. The company’s customers range from small and medium-sized businesses to global hotel chains to world-class educational institutions. Meraki wireless networks serve millions of users on over 10,000 networks in more than 130 countries. Meraki is located in San Francisco, California, and is funded in part by Sequoia Capital and Google. For more information, go to www.meraki.com.
About BT
BT is one of the world’s leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries. Its principal activities include the provision of networked IT services globally; local, national and international telecommunications services to our customers for use at home, at work and on the move; broadband and internet products and services and converged fixed/mobile products and services. BT consists principally of four lines of business: BT Global Services, Openreach, BT Retail and BT Wholesale.
In the year ended 31 March 2009, BT Group’s revenue was £21,390 million.
British Telecommunications plc (BT) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT Group plc and encompasses virtually all businesses and assets of the BT Group. BT Group plc is listed on stock exchanges in London and New York.
For more information, visit www.bt.com/aboutbt
