Wi Fi Buyers Guide - v2
Wi Fi Buyers Guide - v2
BUYER’S GUIDE
Buyer's Guide
The creation of new, digital processes and the shift to hybrid work has
changed business leaders’ opinion of the network. In a recent study, ZK
Research found that 83% of respondents believe the network is important
to business operations (Exhibit 1).
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Exhibit 1: How important is the network to business Exhibit 2: Pervasive Wi-Fi Is Foundational to Business
operations? Success
Source: ZK Research 2023 Network Decision Maker Survey Source: ZK Research, 2023
Any Application
Not
important Any Device
Email
11%
Tablet
Neutral Percasive Wireless
7% Wired Edge
Laptop
Video
Wired Core
Somewhat Very Vertical
important important Smartphone
Devices
24% 59%
Unified Features
M2M
Social Voice
Networking
Looking ahead, the network, particularly the wireless Section II: Introduction to Wi-Fi 6,
network, will play a key role in the adoption of new 6E, and 7
technologies. Businesses will be looking to create
Wi-Fi has gone through five major releases since 1999, and
new customer and employee experiences through the
it sits on the precipice of its most significant upgrade in
deployment of cloud computing, virtual reality (VR) and
history. Wi-Fi 1 through 5 can be thought of as making
augmented reality (AR), 4K video, artificial intelligence
incremental improvements to the original 802.11 standard.
(AI), and mobile devices. Although all these technologies
Wi-Fi 6 is the first Wi-Fi standard engineered specifically
may seem unrelated, they do have one thing in common—
for a world where everything is connected all the time, and
they are all network-centric. This means the success or
it assumes that upload and download speeds need to be
failure of digital initiatives can often hinge on the network—
symmetric. Older versions of Wi-Fi assumed usage to be
particularly Wi-Fi.
infrequent and casual, and they expected there would be
For example, ZK Research recently interviewed a high-end significantly more downloading of data than uploading.
retail store in Europe that implemented a tablet program
The “Wi-Fi 6” terminology is new for the technology.
to provide in-store staff with faster access to customer
Recently, the Wi-Fi Alliance issued new names for Wi-Fi to
information, improving the customer experience. This is
make it simpler for the average person to understand. With
important as customer experience is now the top brand
this release, “Wi-Fi 6” refers to the IEEE standard 802.11ax,
differentiator. However, the retail store did not upgrade
“Wi-Fi 5” is 802.11ac, etc. Exhibit 3 shows the evolution of
its Wi-Fi network as part of the digital project, resulting in
wireless from Wi-Fi 1 through Wi-Fi 7.
poor network performance. ZK Research interviewed many
in-store personnel, and they stated that the slow response Exhibit 3: The Evolution of Wireless LAN
time of the mobile application frustrated customers to the Source: ZK Research, 2023
point where they left the store. The digital transformation
project was designed to increase customer loyalty, but the Frequency Maximum Data
Standard Date
(GHz) Rate (Mbps)
poor Wi-Fi network actually decreased it. Wi-Fi 1 802.11b 1999 2.4 11
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Wi-Fi 5 was a big leap forward in speed, but it was still built is writing out the check. If customer 2 realizes that he/she
with legacy assumptions in mind. For example, it’s common forgot an item and needs to exit the line, the cashier can
for Wi-Fi to perform well in an arena, conference facility then start dealing with customer 3. The exact number of
or other venues prior to an event. However, once the event clients that can transmit simultaneously is dependent on
starts, hundreds or even thousands of people post pictures, channel width and the number of resource units (RUs),
tweet, or use other functions, and then the network which are the number of subchannels created. A Wi-Fi
becomes so slow that it’s often unusable. 6 access point (AP) can designate 26, 52, 106, 242, 484,
and 996 subcarriers (the building blocks of RUs). Exhibit
The issue isn’t Wi-Fi speeds, as 802.11n and later releases 4 shows the number of clients based on the number of
have more than enough bandwidth. The bigger problem subcarriers and the channel width.
with Wi-Fi is how it handles congestion as the network
becomes overcrowded. Wi-Fi 6 solves many of the Exhibit 4: OFDMA Client Matrix
problems with traditional Wi-Fi by completely redesigning Source: ZK Research, 2023
how the technology works, and it takes many best practices
20-MHz 40-MHz 80-MHz 160-MHz
from 4G/LTE networks. Subcarriers
Channel Channel Channel Channel
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• More high-bandwidth channels. The 6 GHz band Consider a typical worker that starts their day operating
supports almost twice as many high-bandwidth (80 at home. In the persons house, they will connect over the
MHz, 160 MHz) channels as 5 GHz. More bandwidth home Wi-Fi network. Once they leave and commute, the
channels means more capacity for network heavy connection will flip to 5G. When the person arrive at the
applications like video streaming, VR, and real time office, the connection will shift back to Wi-Fi. After the
video collaboration. workday, the individual will use a combination of Wi-Fi and
5G depending on where the person is located. It’s important
• No dynamic frequency selection (DFS) scanning
to understand that Wi-Fi 6 will continue to be the access
required. Unlike 160 MHz channels in the 5 GHz
of choice for indoor settings where 5G is better for outdoor
wireless band, devices operating in 6 GHz don’t share
and the coming together of the two can make everyone’s
the spectrum with radar devices or TV stations. As a
lives more consistently connected.
result, people who cannot take advantage of 160 MHz
channels because they live near places like airports or
TV stations can benefit from vacant 160 MHz channels. Section III: Is Wi-Fi 6/6E Right for
• No legacy devices support. The 6 GHz band is You?
exclusive to Wi-Fi 6E so 6 GHz networks do not need Wi-Fi 6/6E’s speed and efficiency give it game-changing
to slow down to accommodate older devices. This potential. Historically, for high-bandwidth applications such
means that Wi-Fi 6E devices can take full advantage of as real-time video and digital signage, businesses had to
the bandwidth, spectrum, and speed improvements of use a wired connection because older versions of Wi-Fi
6 GHz without competing with any non-6E devices. could not deliver the necessary quality. Wi-Fi 6/6E is the
first wireless standard that will enable businesses to shift to
Introducing Wi-Fi 7
an all-wireless workplace where all devices and applications
Wi-Fi 7 is the latest version of the technology and is based connect via Wi-Fi. As technologies such as 4K video,
on the 802.11be standard. The standard has yet to be automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and VR/AR become
ratified but something that it will include are: mainstream, the need for Wi-Fi 6/6E will further increase.
• 320 MHz channels
All businesses should eventually deploy Wi-Fi 6/6E, but
• Multi-link operation for channel aggregation across many will not need to do so immediately. ZK Research has
multiple bands identified three types of companies that should look to
• 4096 QAM for higher peak rates deploy Wi-Fi 6/6E right away:
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that two-thirds of millennials admitted to switching most demanding applications. The network needs
brand loyalties because of a single poor experience. the ability to scale quickly to accommodate the rapid
Not all these instances were due to Wi-Fi, but this growth of mobile applications and other changes in the
example does demonstrate the need to provide the business climate. Also, security must be integrated into
best possible technology. the network to protect its users and the organization
from breaches.
• Companies that use high-bandwidth and immersive
applications: Many businesses have integrated high- • Simple guest access: Having guests connect to the
bandwidth applications into their business processes. wireless network is one of the keys to harnessing the
For example, a furniture manufacturer in the United potential of the connected enterprise. Guest access
Kingdom uses VR headsets to create a virtual “sofa enables businesses to offer visitors Internet access
studio” to enable customers to see what a wide range without compromising the company’s network. While
of sofa models will look like. Another example is a high- the guest is connected to the network, the organization
end retail store in the United States that has created can extract a wealth of contextual information. But with
an entirely new approach to shopping by integrating many solutions, connecting to a guest network can be
technology into the in-store experience. All stores a complicated, multistep process that often requires
have been outfitted with interactive mirrors that greet the intervention of the IT department. Security must
shoppers and invite them to approach. Shoppers can be a top consideration for guest access. Although
tap the screen, choose merchandise, pick a beverage, enterprises secure employee Wi-Fi access with
and even pay for items through the mirror. These are enterprise-grade authentication, they often default
very high-bandwidth to the lowest common denomination of security for
guests, such as a shared PSK-based guest access SSID.
Section IV: Choosing the Right • AI based management tools. Wi-Fi troubleshooting
Wi-Fi Provider is extremely difficult for most network professionals
as there are so many factors for providing consistent
Many options are available to businesses with respect to performance. Most Wi-Fi vendors offer exportable data,
Wi-Fi 6/6E, and decision makers need to ensure they are flow information, and telemetry to provide information
making the best possible choice. Below is a list of criteria that can be used for troubleshooting. The problem
that decision makers should evaluate the product on. is that there is now too much data to be analyzed
manually. AI-based management tools can quickly
• Cloud managed networks. Traditional, on-premises
identify anomalies and inform the engineering team of
controllers when networks were fairly static, and
any problems before they impact business operations.
the majority of workers were in a few offices. IT
All businesses require AI-based tools to support the
administrators are now tasked with managing access
increasingly important Wi-Fi network.
points in hundreds, if not thousands of locations,
including workers’ homes and require a rethinking of • Wi-Fi 6 and 6E products. The two wireless standards
Wi-Fi management. Cloud-managed Wi-Fi creates a are complementary and not competitive. For some
single, unified portal to manage the entire network. companies, the benefits of Wi-Fi 6E will not be enough
Additionally, the management tools should enable to justify an upgrade from Wi-Fi 6. Businesses should
unified management with granular visibility and control, look to use Wi-Fi 6E in areas where device density,
rapid troubleshooting through a single pane of glass. latency, or throughput are issues.
• Robust wired portfolio. Although access is shifting to a • IoT connectivity. As mentioned earlier, IoT devices are
predominantly wireless model, the network still requires set to explode over the next five years. The 2023 ZK
a strong wired backbone. The Wi-Fi vendor should offer Research IoT Device forecast shows that the number
a wide range of wired products that span the campus of connected IoT endpoints will grow from 14B in 2022
edge, campus core, and data center. to 60B in 2030. Many of these devices will connect
using Wi-Fi, but some will use other protocols, such as
• Secure connectivity. As mentioned earlier, for many
Bluetooth. The Wi-Fi 6/6E vendor should offer support
organizations, the wireless network has become their
for all IoT endpoints.
primary network. This means the wireless network
needs to be always on and highly resilient, and it must
provide an excellent quality experience for even the
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Exhibit 5: IoT Devices on the Rise
Section V: Extreme Brings Best in
Connected endpoints (billions), ZK Research Global IoT
Forecast Class Wi-Fi With Flexibility
Extreme Networks has been a pioneer in networking for
70
decades and was one of the first to embrace Wi-Fi 6 and
60
60 6E. The company has invested heavily in its Wi-Fi portfolio
53 and has a highly differentiated solution, which is why it is
50 46 the product of choice for many demanding organizations
40 inleading healthcare, manufacturing, retail, financial services,
40
34 professional sports leagues, half of the Fortune 50 and
30 28 many Fortune 1000 companies. Below are a number of
23 Extreme’s key differentiators.
20 18
14
ExtremeCloud™ IQ
10
This is Extreme’s cloud-based management solution and
0 is designed to help network professionals better manage
2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029 2030
Wi-Fi complexities. The unified management is enhanced
• Flexible solutions. Upgrading the wired and wireless by Machine Learning (ML) and business intelligence (BI).
networks can be highly disruptive to business It provides a wide range of key performance metrics that
operations. The network vendor should offer flexible can be leveraged by IT pros as well as business leaders.
solutions that enable the customer to start with what Also, the product displays a complete view of performance,
they need today but then upgrade, with minimal health, and security across the entire wired, wireless and
disruption when required. WAN infrastructure. Through the cloud portal, customers
can use pre-built templates and workflows to push
• Best in class customer service. While network
management and security policies across the wired and
infrastructure is much simpler to deploy today than
wireless networks.
in years past, problems still occur. When this happens,
given the business-critical nature of the network, the While the product is available primarily as a cloud portal,
network vendor must offer fast and accurate customer large enterprises that want greater control can deploy it as
service to minimize network downtime. Vendors that a private cloud. AIOps capabilities are built into the product
outsource their technical assistant centers (TACs) often to deliver proactive network management. The automated
create unnecessary risk as this introduces unnecessary operations reduce much of the “heavy lifting” required in
delays in remediating any issue. running a network.
Exhibit 6 shows the difference in the various licensing tiers for ExtremeCloud IQ.
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ExtremeCloud IQ is designed to facilitate end-to-end any other preshared key that would be used to connect to
networking by unifying a comprehensive range of network the network. However, the IT administrator has much more
management and analytics applications. Customers benefit control over this. They can tie the key to user identity or
from Universal Licensing across Wired and Wireless with the MAC address that uses to uses that key. This simplifies
our simple, value-based licensing tiers: Connect, Pilot, and the process of assigning devices to VLANs, creating QoS
CoPilot. policies, and tunnels while ensuring each users identity is
unique.
Universal Hardware
All network vendors offer multiple hardware portfolios, IoT Solutions
but only Extreme makes it easy to move between them. Extreme offers a broad set of IoT solutions. Its Wi-Fi
Typically, moving between product families from the same APs support all major IoT protocol including Bluetooth,
vendor requires a forklift upgrade. Extreme’s Universal Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), USB connections, Theade
Platform brings a level of cloud-native software agility to and Zigbee. Also, though ExtremeCloud IQ, businesses
networking that’s unique to it. can manage all aspects of IoT including security policies,
network segmentation to isolate IoT devices from other
Through Universal Hardware, customers can start with one traffic and monitor IoT behavior to quickly find breaches.
software feature set and then switch or add capabilities
when required. Licenses are pooled and made available in
ExtremeCloud IQ enabling customers to make the software Section VI: Conclusion
portable across products. Benefits of Universal Hardware and Recommendations
include: Businesses leaders and IT pros are under more pressure
• Feature set is decoupled from hardware and can be than ever before. All companies must now focus on building
changed a strategy to capitalize on the new digital era opportunities
but also redesign the workplace for hybrid work. The first
• No rip and replace to evolve to a new technology/use
step in the evolution is to ensure a modernized wireless
case
network as Wi-Fi has become the primary access method
• Simple, poolable and portable licensing across switches for people and devices.
and access points
In the past, the wireless network in most organizations
• One license for any device
was treated as a tactical resource used to incrementally
• Consistent warranty across universal wired/wireless improve productivity by untethering employees from their
platforms desks. In a connected business, Wi-Fi is a strategic asset
that can be used to create new business processes and
Products supported under Universal Hardware include 7520
change the way organizations interact with employees,
and 7720 aggregation/core switches, 5000 Series fixed
customers, and others. This will increase customer loyalty,
form wiring closet and edge switches and Wi-Fi 6/6E APs
enable the creation of new processes, lower costs and bring
Private Preshared Key (PPSK) Wi-Fi Security productivity to new heights.
802.1X is the gold standard for Wi-Fi authentication, but it Building a robust wireless network using Wi-Fi 6/6E should
can be difficult to deploy and configure because it requires be a top initiative for business and IT leaders. However, the
certificate management. It’s also hard to troubleshoot market is evolving rapidly, and developing a strategy can be
when problems arise. There is an alternative standard, a challenge. To help organizations get started, ZK Research
WPA2-Personal, based on shared keys, but this is far from makes the following recommendations:
enterprise-grade security as each device uses the same key.
• Expand the definition of mobility. Wi-Fi 5 ushered in
If one device is breached, all devices can be impacted.
a new era of Wi-Fi in which businesses could make
Extreme offers PPSK, which provides the high security the vision of mobile everywhere a reality. Many of the
benefits of 802.1X, but with the ease of deployment of innovations in Wi-Fi 6/6E expand the value proposition
WPA2-Personal. With PPSK each user has a unique key, that of mobility as it can support the explosion of IoT
be used to connect to the network. For the user, it looks like devices and high-density environments. Wi-Fi 6/6E
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enables a wide range of new use cases, and IT leaders
should no longer be concerned with choosing between
the performance of wired and convenience of mobility.
Wi-Fi 6/6E provides both.
• Understand that experience matters for business
success. The wireless network contains a wealth
of information about those who are connected to
it. This data should be collected and analyzed to
help companies better understand the behavior of
individuals. Being mobile will create a competitive
advantage today, and the data and analytics related to
mobile users will enable digital businesses to maintain a
leadership position over the long term.
• Choose a network vendor based on today’s needs.
When choosing a technology vendor, it’s often easiest
to choose the incumbent supplier or the one with
the most market share. This can be a sound strategy
in legacy markets. However, when markets are in
transition, it’s important to choose a vendor that can
meet your demands both today and, in the future —and
this vendor is often not the incumbent. Here are some
of the criteria that should be considered:
• Robust and converged wired and wireless portfolio
• End-to-end management of network, devices and
policies
• AI based management capabilities
• Extended network to include IoT devices
• Application experience assurance
• Best in class customer experience
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