Sandals Resorts Selects Ruckus Wireless for Large-Scale Indoor/Outdoor 802.11n Smart Mesh Deployment

World Famous Resort Chain Gives Guests Unprecedented Wi-Fi Speed and Coverage Throughout 20 Caribbean Vacation Properties

SUNNYVALE, CA, July 7, 2008 – Ruckus Wireless announced that it has been selected by Sandals Resorts International to supply Smart Wireless LAN equipment for all of its Caribbean locations including Sandals Resorts, Beaches Resorts and The Royal Plantation Collection

The Ruckus Smart WLAN products are currently being installed to provide high-speed Wi-Fi service across more than 750 acres of resort property, supporting more than 5,000 guest rooms. Sandals plans to use the new high-speed Wi-Fi network to support myriad applications ranging from reliable ultra high-speed broadband access for guests to digital signage, voice over IP, point-of-sale and video applications.

The Sandals 802.11n Smart Wi-Fi network leverages recent advances in Smart Mesh Networking that enables access points to be deployed without Ethernet cabling. With Smart Mesh Networking, Sandals Resorts will provide ubiquitous and high-speed Wi-Fi services across its resorts, providing Wi-Fi service to areas such as beaches, villas, gazebos, restaurants, coffee shops, pools, patios and other common areas for guest satisfaction.

Each resort is diverse, comprised of many different areas, building materials and obstacles. For instance, the Sandals Grande Ocho Rios Beach & Villa Resort, a 100-acre resort property, houses eight gourmet restaurants and twelve bars, seven outdoor main pools, 93 semi-private pools, four tennis courts, two fitness centers, two self-contained spas, 22 whirlpools and four saunas.

"The combination of 802.11n and Smart Mesh networking is a compelling alternative to conventional wireless LAN systems," said Selina Lo, president and CEO of Ruckus Wireless. "It gives companies a future proofed system that allows them to more cost-effectively monetize wireless services while giving end users the best possible experience. Sandals Resorts is the perfect case study on how to do 802.11n right."

Wi-Fi That Goes Farther, Faster and Around Obstacles Keeping Guests Unplugged but Well Connected

According to Sandals, the Ruckus ZoneFlex system was selected over competitive alternatives due to its ability to provide longer range directional Wi-Fi signals, that are automatically steered around interference and obstacles, thereby providing guests consistent and reliable Wi-Fi connections.

"Sandals Resorts has built a reputation providing luxury services that are simply exceptional," said Bobby Stewart, Treasury Director at Sandals Resorts. "Why should providing world-class Wi-Fi be any different?"

The large-scale Sandals deployment includes hundreds of Ruckus Wireless indoor and outdoor ZoneFlex 802.11n Smart Wi-Fi access points along with ZoneDirector Smart WLAN controllers to deliver Wi-Fi services across virtually 100 percent of each property including hundreds of meters of beach.

"After looking at a number of alternatives, we weren't able to find a wireless solution capable of delivering the range, reliability and consistent performance needed to properly service our guests while supporting a whole host of new planned applications such as Wi-Fi phones for staff and guests," said Stewart. "That's when we found the Ruckus ZoneFlex 802.11n system."

According to Sandals, the Ruckus ZoneFlex system was the only WLAN system to support wireless meshing with 802.11n at a fraction of the cost of comparable alternatives. "802.11n coupled with wireless meshing is a very unique and powerful combination that gives us more flexibility in terms of what we might want to do in the future," said Stewart.

While Sandals has provided high-speed wired connectivity in its properties for some time, the resorts have noticed that more and more guests are bringing Wi-Fi-enabled devices on vacation – and have responded accordingly to meet that guest need. "Most of our guests spend their time outdoors so we had a big challenge of how to cost-effectively deliver higher-speed Wi-Fi in the public and common areas where there isn't a lot of Ethernet cabling," said Stewart.

Sandals wanted robust Wi-Fi that both minimized the number of access points required for complete coverage while unifying the indoor and outdoor environments into a single, centrally managed wireless LAN. The Ruckus ZoneFlex system lets Sandals easily enhance their indoor coverage by placing additional, higher speed 802.11n access points wherever coverage is needed without having to run additional cable drops. Meanwhile Sandals is deploying Ruckus ZoneFlex outdoor 802.11n units that tie into the same Smart WLAN and are managed through a single interface with the indoor units.

"With 802.11n and Smart Mesh networking we now have the capacity to support a large number of simultaneous users, the coverage to provide this capacity everywhere, the flexibility to add new Wi-Fi simply and easily and the ability to manage the entire network from a single spot," concluded Stewart.