New State-of-the-Art Stadium Depends on an
Aruba Wired and Wireless Network to Deliver Streamlined Entry,
Cashless Concessions, Massive HD Displays and More
Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company (NYSE: HPE), today
announced that Columbus Crew, the Major League Soccer (MLS)
reigning champion, has deployed an Aruba ESP converged wired and
wireless network to streamline and automate stadium operations such
as ticketing and security, as well as provide reliable,
high-performing Wi-Fi and new matchday experiences to fans. The
Crew’s new Lower.com Field sits on 12 acres, accommodates more than
20,000 fans and also features a 62,000-square-foot public plaza
equipped with a 14’x24’ video board to host concerts, watch parties
and other public events.
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With the vision to create a
next-generation seamless fan journey from ticket purchase to the
parking lot and through the stadium gates, the Columbus Crew
deployed a combination of Aruba’s wired and wireless solutions that
support the stadium’s technology-enabled amenities, including
pervasive Wi-Fi connectivity, opt-in facial recognition ticketing,
Evolv Express security screening, and mobile ordering and cashless
payment throughout the venue. (Photo: Business Wire)
With the vision to create a next-generation seamless fan journey
from ticket purchase to the parking lot and through the stadium
gates, the Crew deployed a combination of Aruba’s wired and
wireless solutions that support the stadium’s technology-enabled
amenities, including pervasive Wi-Fi connectivity, opt-in facial
recognition ticketing, Evolv Express security screening, and mobile
ordering and cashless payment throughout the venue.
“One of the first things that we really focused on is providing
a great connectivity experience, not only in the seats, but
everywhere in the stadium,” said Brandon Covert, vice president of
Information Technology for Haslam Sports Group. “At the gates, when
there are 12,000 people waiting to get in and they’re trying to
pull up their tickets, or when walking through the concourses at
halftime among 20,000 people, it is a very challenging environment
for live venues. That is one of the major reasons we pushed really
hard towards a very robust Aruba infrastructure.”
The Crew’s opt-in facial recognition system is a unique ingress
process that starts with ticketing. Fans can log into their ticket
account, take a selfie photo and link that picture to their
account. When they arrive at Lower.com Field, a Wicket kiosk
connected to the same wireless network identifies the fan’s face
and corresponding tickets on their account. Alternatively, fans can
use the traditional Ticketmaster barcode scan on their phone.
“The beauty with facial recognition is fans can redeem all of
their tickets with one glance versus scanning each separate ticket,
it creates a much smoother process,” said Covert. “The fan just
walks up and takes about a second to look at the Wicket kiosk and
their admitted group can walk right through the gates. This
technology has cut the time it takes to get into the stadium by
more than 50 percent. When it comes to funnelling thousands of fans
into the stadium at the same time, this adds up to significant time
savings.”
Hyper-Converged HPE Aruba Infrastructure
At the former Crew venue (Historic Crew Stadium), the IT team
managed disparate parallel overlapping networks in one building.
One of their operational goals for Lower.com Field was to converge
everything not only to one network, but extend it all the way
through their technology stack for a hyper-converged technology
infrastructure.
“We wanted to go with this hyper-converged environment and
really push the limits and that led us towards the Aruba and HPE
solution over competitors that don't have that whole breadth of
hyper-converged all the way including compute, storage, switching,
and more,” said Covert.
In collaboration with trusted technology partner IBM iX, the
Crew selected and deployed a future-ready wireless network
comprised of Aruba Wi-Fi 6 indoor access points (APs), outdoor APs,
and mobility controllers. For wired networking, the Crew
implemented Aruba’s access switches at the edge and CX Series
switches for aggregation and in the data center. Additionally, the
Crew uses ClearPass for network access control (NAC) and policy
management, and AirWave for network management. They have also
implemented NetEdit for coordinating switch configuration,
monitoring and troubleshooting.
“It was important for us to make network management simple
because we're a smaller team that handles our technology functions
internally. We needed a solution that we could maintain and operate
easily, and we found that in the Aruba solution,” said Covert.
About Columbus Crew
Columbus Crew is the first club in Major League Soccer. The Crew
is operated by The Edwards Family and Haslam Sports Group. The
Black & Gold are the 2020 MLS Cup Champions. The Club won its
first MLS Cup championship in 2008 and also won the 2002 Lamar Hunt
U.S. Open Cup as well as MLS Supporters’ Shield titles in 2004,
2008 and 2009. The 2021 campaign is the Columbus Crew’s 26th season
in MLS as well as the Club’s final season at Historic Crew Stadium
-- the first soccer-specific stadium in the United States – and the
Crew’s inaugural season at Lower.com Field.
Website: ColumbusCrew.com | Twitter: @ColumbusCrew | Instagram:
@ColumbusCrew | Hashtag: #Crew96 | Facebook.com/Columbus crew |
App: ColumbusCrew.com/app | Stadium: Lower.com Field | Training
Facility: OhioHealth Performance Center
About Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company
Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, is the global
leader in secure, intelligent edge-to-cloud networking solutions
that use AI to automate the network, while harnessing data to drive
powerful business outcomes. With Aruba ESP (Edge Services Platform)
and as-a-service options, Aruba takes a cloud-native approach to
helping customers meet their connectivity, security, and financial
requirements across campus, branch, data center, and remote worker
environments, covering all aspects of wired, wireless LAN, and wide
area networking (WAN).
To learn more, visit Aruba at 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 the Airheads Community at
community.arubanetworks.com.
View source
version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211005005128/en/
Media Contacts: Kari Curto Aruba, a Hewlett Packard
Enterprise company +1 650-504-1076 kari.curto@hpe.com
Kathleen Keith Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company
+1-707-529-4507 kathleen.keith@hpe.com
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