HP buys Wi-Fi gear maker Aruba Networks for $3 billion

An Aruba AP inside the Moda Center

An Aruba AP inside the Moda Center

The rumors from last week were confirmed Monday, as computing giant Hewlett-Packard (aka “HP”) announced it was acquiring Wi-Fi gear vendor Aruba Networks for $3 billion. After cash and debt are accounted for, the actual value of the transaction is $2.7 billion, but what’s $300 million between friends?

Though the headline of the HP release pegs the reason behind the deal as the desire to “create an industry leader in enterprise mobility,” the acquisition will likely cause a lot of business activity in our corner of the world, namely wireless network deployments for large public venues, like stadiums. Over the past year, Aruba has been making a name for itself with high-profile Wi-Fi deployments in venues like the San Francisco 49ers’ new Levi’s Stadium, Texas A&M University’s Kyle Field, and the Dallas Mavericks’ American Airlines Center, among others. Perhaps the most interesting question from a business perspective is whether being part of HP will help or hurt Aruba when it comes to making stadium deals, and whether or not using HP core networking gear will become a required (or preferred) part of prospective stadium Wi-Fi deals.

On a business-wide view, the second $3 billion acquisition this year in the DAS/Wi-Fi space (following CommScope’s $3 billion purchase of DAS and networking supplier TE Connectivity) is perhaps a signal that consolidation is upon us in the greater Wi-Fi and local networking marketplace. Though we didn’t know exactly how and when such deals would shake out, on one hand it’s not that much of a surprise to us since we have always believed that the stadium networking market is really just a precursor to what will eventually happen in other large public venues as well as in large public places like cities and towns: Wi-Fi, which already carries more wireless data than cellular, will continue to expand and appear in more places, generating new business ideas like Wi-Fi phones and Wi-Fi first wireless plans.

The appearance of IBM as a strong entrant in the stadium wireless space can also be looked at as another signal that bigger players are entering the market, which usually means that smaller players — like the Arubas of the world — get snapped up, like a star player being traded mid-year to a team seeking a championship. Cisco, which is no stranger to acquisitions, has been quiet of late, and we are noticing that telecom gear giant Ericsson is making more moves toward Wi-Fi, especially in the arena of small cells and the idea of bringing LTE to Wi-Fi frequencies. Sounds like the Wi-Fi market is moving up from the $10 tables into the green- and black-chip territory.

Who’s next in the Wi-Fi world as an acquisition target? The easy picks are players like Ruckus Wireless and Aerohive Networks, given their ability to conduct their own IPOs. But we’re also guessing there may be some digesting of other smaller concerns in the Wi-Fi DAS food chain as the bigger players seek to add skills, customers and technology via purchases. Stay tuned for what should be an exciting year in the enterprise and stadium Wi-Fi business arena.

Stadium Tech Report — NFL stadium technology reports — NFC West

Editor’s note: The following team-by-team capsule reports of NFL stadium technology deployments are an excerpt from our most recent Stadium Tech Report, THE FOOTBALL ISSUE. To get all the capsules in one place as well as our featured reports, interviews and analysis, download your free copy of the full report today.

NFC WEST

Reporting by Chris Gallo

Arizona Cardinals
University of Phoenix Stadium
Seating Capacity: 65,000
Wi-Fi – Yes
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

As the site of the Super Bowl XLIX, University of Phoenix Stadium is in the midst of massive upgrades. This includes an $8 million dollar improvement for faster wireless and larger video boards. The stadium turned eight this summer and already has one Super Bowl under its belt. Look for more information about upgrades throughout the year before the big game on Feb. 1, 2015.

San Francisco 49ers
Levi’s Stadium
Seating Capacity: 68,500
Wi-Fi – Yes, 1,200 access points
DAS – Yes, 700 antennas
Beaconing – Yes

View from the Pepsi seating porch at the north end of Levi's Stadium

View from the Pepsi seating porch at the north end of Levi’s Stadium

There is a buzz around Levi’s Stadium entering this season. And for good reason. The brand-new venue boasts more than 1,200 Wi-Fi access points and 700 DAS antennas. Aruba Networks (Wi-Fi) and DAS Group Professionals are hoping to fulfill the 49ers’ desires to own the most-connected stadium in all of sports. An ambitious new team app, with replays and food ordering and delivery to all seats is also part of the technology offerings.

Early tests of the stadium network during the preseason and regular season opener were promising, with Wi-Fi performance at Super Bowl-surpassing levels. On the DAS side, strong cellular signals were reached, with a nearly full house of fans. The question for the network, like the team itself – can it keep performing at a high level during the full season?

Seattle Seahawks
CenturyLink Field
Seating Capacity: 72,000
Wi-Fi-Yes
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

Fans of the reigning Super Bowl Champions will have more to cheer for in coming years at CenturyLink Field. The question is, will the loudest stadium in the NFL stay that way if Seahawks fans are using their phones more often, now that Verizon has installed stadium-wide Wi-Fi using Extreme Networks equipment?

St. Louis Rams
Edward Jones Dome
Seating Capacity: 66,000
Wi-Fi – No
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

After a proposed $700 million dollar upgrade was rejected, the St. Louis Rams are still seeking to improve the Edward Jones Dome. The good news for fans is that for this season a Mobilitie neutral-host DAS should significantly improve cellular communications not just in the stadium itself, but also in the adjacent convention center.

Niners: More than 1,000 fans used in-seat food delivery at 2nd Levi’s Stadium preseason game

Screen grab from Levi's Stadium app showing in-seat food delivery option. Credit all photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report.

Screen grab from Levi’s Stadium app showing in-seat food delivery option. Credit all photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report.

One of the more unique features the San Francisco 49ers are introducing at their new home this year is the ability for all fans to have food and drink delivered to them, no matter which one of Levi’s Stadium’s 68,500 seats they are in. And according to the Niners, the feature is quickly catching on, with more than 1,000 in-seat orders delivered at the second preseason game at Levi’s on Aug. 24.

At a Levi’s media technology tour Wednesday, the Niners’ tech staff provided an in-depth and up-close look at some of the new stadium’s network infrastructure, including a quick glimpse of one of the several data-center rooms. Dan Williams, vice president of technology for the Niners, said that at the first preseason game at Levi’s on Aug. 17, more fans used the “express pickup” service to order food that they could then pick up at concession stand windows than the seat-delivery feature. But at the second game against the San Diego Chargers, more fans went for the in-seat option, perhaps a sign that Niners fans are learning and testing the new stadium services as they go.

“It’s going to be an ongoing education process,” said Martin Manville, business operations analyst for the Niners and one of the key tech leaders on the Levi’s app team. Manville said the Niners had learned a lot about food delivery in test situations at Candlestick Park last season — and some of those lessons are now evident in the Levi’s delivery menu, which is stripped down to ensure the food runners can get grub to fans before it gets cold (or warm, in the case of cold beverages). According to Manville the average delivery time at the Aug. 24 game was between 10 and 12 minutes, but the team expects that “normal” delays during the regular season will be closer to 15 to 20 minutes per order.

Still, that’s not a bad option if you don’t want to leave your seat and you don’t mind the extra $5 delivery charge. One early interesting stat from the food-delivery process is that the Niners found more orders coming from the “cheap seats” in the north and south stands at Levi’s than from the 50-yard-line seats where the high rollers sit. According to Manville, since the fans in the club seats have easy access to numerous uncrowded concession stands they may not see the need for the in-seat options.

Wi-Fi APs: 600 in Levi’s bowl seating

Under-seat Wi-Fi AP at Levi's Stadium.

Under-seat Wi-Fi AP at Levi’s Stadium.

Some other news nuggets from the tech tour day: According to Williams, of the 1,200 Wi-Fi access points at Levi’s, 600 of those are distributed in the seating areas (aka “the bowl”), with the other 600 placed in suites, concourses and other stadium areas. Williams said the Aruba Networks Wi-Fi antennas are basically split into three types — regular enterprise-type APs for suite and office areas, regular outdoor APs for concourse areas, and more specialized versions (including the under-seat APs) for bowl placements.

— For the app itself, the Niners said that there have been 80,000 downloads so far, with almost half of the season ticket holders having put their ticketing information into the app. The “NiNerds,” the geek-dressed help squad that provides fans with personal assistance with the app, is now at about 50 or 60 strong at each event (originally the team had said it wanted to hire 150 such Wi-Fi coaches). The Niners said the NiNerds will be doing more pro-active app education going forward, doing things like approaching fans in concession lines to see if they know about the express line or in-seat ordering options.

— Though Comcast’s 10-year deal with the Niners calls for the cable provider to bring in two 10-gigabit backbone pipes, the Niners are often quoted as saying they have 40 GB of backbone bandwidth. We solved this mystery today: According to Comcast, the other two 10-GB pipes are a redundant channel from another (unnamed) provider. So: the stadium does have four 10 GB bandwidth pipes, by far the most capacity in any stadium we’ve heard of.

— More traffic stats: Though we will break these down in a separate post, the Niners said that for the Aug. 24 game fans used 1.96 Terabytes of Wi-Fi traffic, just a bit lower than the 2.13 TB used at the first preseason game on Aug. 17. The team also provided some DAS stats, claiming fans used another 1.02 TB of cellular data at the two preseason games combined.

Tech tour photos follow… including a sighting of some (shhhh!) Cisco equipment in the data center racks… click on photos for larger images.

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams (left) and COO Al Guido kick off the Wednesday tech tour.

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams (left) and COO Al Guido kick off the Wednesday tech tour.

Ted Girdner, Comcast VP of business services for California, talks stadium networking.

Ted Girdner, Comcast VP of business services for California, talks stadium networking.

Dan Williams talks Wi-Fi while the Levi's Stadium new turf grows silently behind him.

Dan Williams talks Wi-Fi while the Levi’s Stadium new turf grows silently behind him.

Mystery Cisco gear inside Levi's Stadium data center. Alert! Intruder!

Mystery Cisco gear inside Levi’s Stadium data center. Alert! Intruder!

Brocade router at Levi's Stadium data center. One of many. As in, many many.

Brocade router at Levi’s Stadium data center. One of many. As in, many many.

Wi-Fi gear in Levi's Stadium data room.

Wi-Fi gear in Levi’s Stadium data room.

Franks and DAS: DGP DAS antennas above food station.

Franks and DAS: DGP DAS antennas above food station.

Screenshot of food feature on Levi's Stadium app. Note the green light buttons to show expected wait times for express option.

Screenshot of food feature on Levi’s Stadium app. Note the green light buttons to show expected wait times for express option.

Obligatory Levi's Stadium selfie. MSR shirts complete the style.

Obligatory Levi’s Stadium selfie. MSR shirts complete the style.

Stadium Tech Report: Aruba Networks chief engineer on building the ‘ultimate stadium’ network at Levi’s

Chuck Lukaszewski, Aruba Networks

Chuck Lukaszewski, Aruba Networks

For Chuck Lukaszewski, getting the job to design the Wi-Fi network at Levi’s Stadium was a bit of a personal perfect storm: Having long desired to build the ultimate stadium Wi-Fi network, he’d finally been matched with a customer with plans and a budget to fulfill that dream.

Lukaszewski, the senior director for outdoor solutions engineering at Levi’s Wi-Fi gear supplier Aruba Networks, said the aggressive vision for connected fan engagement put forth by the San Francisco 49ers and their vice president of technology Dan Williams was a plan Lukaszewski had long wanted to pursue.

“I had a vision of how to build an ‘ultimate stadium,’ and Dan said he wanted an ultimate stadium,” said Lukaszewski in a recent phone interview. “He gave me the freedom to design something that had never really been done before. It was a real meeting of the minds.”

By early results, the joint effort is by all standards a success, with network traffic statistics from the first football game at Levi’s showing a robust Wi-Fi network with Super Bowl levels of user traffic. According to Lukaszewski, by the time kickoff rolled around for the Niners’ preseason game against the Denver Broncos on Aug. 17, the Wi-Fi network at Levi’s Stadium had already surpassed the three most recent Super Bowls when it came to concurrent network usage, and had also exceeded the peak network usage statistics from the recent World Cup finale in Brazil.

While the network still hasn’t been tested in a regular-season game, or with the planned instant-replay feature active on the Levi’s Stadium app, it’s probably safe to say that at the very least, Lukaszewski and Williams have hit the ground running successfully. And while the network team did have some factors in their favor – including the ability to blend the wireless infrastructure into the overall stadium buildout and the budget for 1,200 Wi-Fi APs – there was still significant work that had to be done to produce a wireless experience with the magnitude of Levi’s offering.

Avoiding the ‘circular firing squad of RF’ in antenna deployment

According to Lukaszewski, he’s had experience deploying Wi-Fi networks in many unusual or difficult places, including on oil tankers and on financial-market trading floors. But stadiums, he said, especially open-air arenas like football stadiums, require a much higher level of deployment expertise, especially when you are trying to provide an extremely high level of connectivity to every seat in the stadium, as the Niners wanted to do at their new 68,500-seat home in Santa Clara, Calif.

“The 49ers have a completely unique view of the connectivity experience in a stadium – it’s the whole relationship of a fan with home,” said Lukaszewski. “Technology is just one piece of that. And [wireless] connectivity, is the last yard.”

Under-seat Wi-Fi AP at Levi's Stadium.

Under-seat Wi-Fi AP at Levi’s Stadium.

But just like that last three feet into the end zone, the last yard is often the toughest distance to cover when it comes to providing Wi-Fi connectivity. Unlike cellular operators, who own and control their licensed swath of spectrum, Wi-Fi networks operate in the unlicensed band of airwaves, and have an unknown number and type of end-user customers to support. According to Lukaszewski, designing and deploying a large-scale stadium Wi-Fi network is extremely more difficult than building a similar cellular network, mainly because of the interference situation.

“The classic design for a cellular DAS [distributed antenna system] in a stadium is to just put antennas high up, all the way around the bowl, pointing down,” said Lukaszewski. “That’s completely inefficient for Wi-Fi – we call it the ‘RF circular firing squad.’ Cellular owners can do that because they are exclusive owners of their spectrum and can bathe the bowl in signals. With Wi-Fi we have to ‘share the air’ in a ‘listen before talk’ environment.”

APs under seats, close to the fans

Without getting too deep into the specifics of Wi-Fi networking, what Lukaszewski, Williams and their teams needed to do was to figure out how many Wi-Fi access points (APs) they would need to provide high-quality connectivity to every seat in the house, and where to put them not just to provide the connection, but to also avoid interfering with signals from other close-by APs. While some of the planning can be done beforehand, Lukaszewski said that like in a restaurant kitchen, the final product often involves some hands-on refinement.

“You have a recipe, but you taste it and change it as you go,” Lukaszewski said, comparing the Levi’s deployment to a dinner dish. “We start out by going with the plan, then take a lot of data and make changes in real time.”

In the Niners’ favor was the fact that Levi’s Stadium was built from the ground up with the connectivity in mind, which made it much easier to deploy the network than in older stadiums where wiring and antennas need to be retrofitted into existing structures. Things like the many under-the-seat APs at Levi’s, with their wiring holes and mounting infrastructure designed into blueprints, might require concrete drilling and unsightly cable runs at stadiums built before networking was a pressing need.

“It’s always better when you can design it in,” said Lukaszewski of the wireless infrastructure. “The key is to have lots of low power cells, right among the people. That’s how we extract capacity. To get that you have to mount APs, and get the wiring to them. That can be very expensive in a retrofit. And it’s not always going to look very nice when you do it.”

More recipes for different events

Even with the impressive stats from the initial game, Lukaszewski was fast to note that the Levi’s Stadium wireless network is far from a finished product.

“We still have a lot of work to do – we’re definitely not done trying yet.” Lukaszewski said. “Every game, we want to get a little better.”

Typically in a stadium situation, Lukaszewski said, it may take 5 to 6 big events for the network team to really lock in on the tuning and tweaking necessary to make the network run at optimal performance. But even then, there’s still work to be done since the network requirements often differ greatly for different event types and crowds.

“There can be, more than one [network] recipe,” Luckszewski said. “The use case for a concert, for example, is way different than a football game. In an indoor stadium where you have both basketball and hockey, you may have 3 or 4 recipes, depending on the event.” Levi’s Stadium, he noted, is already scheduled to host several different types of events, including soccer games, high school football games, and an NHL game early next year.

But even as Lukaszewski, Williams and their teams continue to improve on their work, the early returns seem to suggest that the Niners have accomplished what they set out to build at their new home: A connected stadium that provides a fan experience unlike that found in most other large public venues.

“I think the 49ers have set an example for any team, in any sport,” Lukaszewski said.

Holy Terabyte! First football crowd at Levi’s Stadium uses 2.13 TB of Wi-Fi traffic, with nearly 25K fans on Wi-Fi at once

Levi's Stadium from Section 244. All photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report

Levi’s Stadium from Section 244. All photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report

All those predictions about Silicon Valley people using a stadium network more than other fans? It looks like they’re true.

The network numbers are in for the first football game at Levi’s Stadium, and they are pretty amazing: According to Dan Williams, the vice president of technology for the San Francisco 49ers, the Levi’s Stadium Wi-Fi network carried 2.13 terabytes of data during last Sunday’s preseason game, with a peak of 24,775 fans on the Wi-Fi network at the same time. Those numbers are comparable to the latest Super Bowl at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, where according to AT&T and Verizon there was approximately 2.5 TB of data used on wireless networks.

The kicker to the Niners’ stats — they do NOT include any traffic figures from the Levi’s Stadium DAS, the distributed antenna system that is meant to provide enhanced cellular coverage in the stadium. What follows is an email Q-and-A with Williams, who kindly answered our extensive list of questions. The real question is, if Niners fans are hitting terabyte levels during preseason games, what’s going to happen when the season starts for real? And the instant replay function in the team app is live? Read on for some great insight from Williams. Additional editor’s note: The companies talked about include Aruba Networks, the provider of Wi-Fi gear; Brocade, provider of back-end networking gear and integration; DAS Group Professionals, the integrator and deployment team behind the DAS (the network of small antennas that improve in-building cellular coverage).

Mobile Sports Report: what was the peak number for simultaneous Wi-Fi connections? The average?
Dan Williams: We peaked at 24,775 (roughly 38% of attendance) concurrent connections with an average of 16,862 (roughly 25% of attendance).

MSR: When did connections spike? When did they start and then tail off?
Williams: We had two spikes, 1:02 p.m. [editor’s note: kickoff was 1 p.m.] with a system wide peak of 2.3Gbps and then again at 1:53 p.m. with 1.7Gbps. We averaged more than 1Gbps for more than two hours.

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams attempts to fix my Droid 4 Wi-Fi issues (while trying not to laugh at the fact that I actually have and use a Droid 4)

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams attempts to fix my Droid 4 Wi-Fi issues (while trying not to laugh at the fact that I actually have and use a Droid 4)

MSR: What was the total data tonnage on the Wi-Fi network?
Williams: We offloaded 2.13 Terabytes during the event.

MSR: What were the usage patterns with the app — which feature did people use most?
Williams: We had a great deal of usage throughout Sunday. The food ordering app usage was top of the list with ticketing being a close second while video would take third from a feature standpoint.

MSR: What are the plans with the instant replay feature… when will it be live (and can you explain why it was held back)?
Williams: We felt a lot of folks were happy with the livestream, so we wanted to focus more on a couple of core features with food ordering and ticketing a bit more at this point. Replays will be available to all by the first regular season home game.

MSR: Can you explain exactly how the location feature works… does it require Bluetooth to be on?
Williams: The location service is mainly built around low-energy Bluetooth, BLE. We have a number of beacons placed throughout the open areas and points-of-interest which allow the app to identify your location through proximity. Aruba helped us build this as well. GPS is also used but the primary resource is Bluetooth. The app prompts users to enable Bluetooth to provide improved location awareness.

One of the big screens in Levi's Stadium.

One of the big screens in Levi’s Stadium.

MSR: Can you provide any stats on the DAS performance?
Williams: The DAS held up really well. Like WiFi, we found some areas that need tuning. Unlike WiFi, the carriers protect a lot of their specific data but they have told us they are very happy with the system DGP helped us with. It is important to note our DAS and WiFi have been built to compliment each other and I think between Aruba and DGP, we did that very well. Most come here looking to connect to WiFi but our story internally has been we are going to have an awesome connectivity play regardless of medium.

MSR: Could you guys see any [more] of the 2.4 GHz issues like the one I had?
Williams: As you know, 2.4GHz is limited with non-overlapping channels so we suspect a number of legacy devices may have some problems. That said, we had a ratio of 2:1 with respects to 5GHz to 2.4GHz [usage] which shows a good deal of 2.4GHz usage. We know we still have some optimizations to do in the upper bowl and upper concourse while we continue to fine-tune the main bowl and concourse as we noticed our cell edge was weaker than expected when the stands were full. Our Aruba team did a great job capturing real-time data during the event as there is really no other way to test this stuff without a full venue. We will make some tweaks and continue to learn more from every event we host. Between Aruba, Brocade, and the 49er tech staff, we are not resting on our laurels. We know there is more to do.

Stadium Tech Report: Levi’s Stadium network lives up to hype, but team app still needs work

Levi's Stadium from Section 244. All photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report

Levi’s Stadium from Section 244. All photos: Paul Kapustka, Mobile Sports Report

At the very least San Francisco 49ers fans Sunday could take heart in the fact that the wireless network in Levi’s Stadium largely lived up to its advance billing, performing quite well even as the team on the field sputtered and failed to connect. In its first “real” test with an almost-full house on Sunday the Levi’s Wi-Fi and cellular networks seemed to work well throughout the game, delivering solid speed test results from almost every part of the new 68,500-seat facility, even as Colin Kaepernick and the rest of the 49ers were dealt a 34-0 preseason drubbing by Peyton Manning and the visiting Denver Broncos.

And just like the team, the Niners’ stadium technology lineup still has some weak spots that will hopefully be fixed before the regular season home opener on Sept. 14. Among the disappointments Sunday was a no-show by the highly heralded instant replay feature, the crown jewel of the new Levi’s Stadium app. We also experienced some location-connection problems with one of our devices, exposing what we consider a flaw in the Levi’s app, namely an over-reliance on location technologies to enable key parts of the app, like wayfinding and on-site video streaming.

Ticket scanner with Niners visor to block sun

Ticket scanner with Niners visor to block sun

Some other not-so-advanced technology flaws that could use fine-tuning include the volume level on the main stadium public-address and announcing system, which was so loud that it made it a struggle just to talk to the person next to you for long stretches of time. The ticket scanning machines also seemed to have issues working in the bright sunlight, a problem that found a low-tech fix when ticket personnel placed Niners’ visors around the tops of the machines to shade the scanning area. And many concession stands around the stadium were unable to serve guests or could only take cash because the staff operating the stands said they weren’t given access codes to the point-of-sale systems.

Overall, however, the first football game at Levi’s was a success on many levels, including the fantastic sight lines available from most seats and largely incident-free travel and parking operations, with noticed improvements especially on the VTA light rail front that struggled mightily during the stadium’s opening-event soccer game two weekends ago. Most fans also probably got a little weight loss from the no extra-charge sauna situation, thanks to the cloudless day and bright sun that bathed most of the seats in searing heat for long times after the 1 p.m. start.

Smooth start for early VTA riders

What follows here is a somewhat minute-by-minute account of my trip to the game, and my experience with the network and stadium operations on site.

Mtn View lot sign, not in operation at 9:30 a.m.

Mtn View lot sign, not in operation at 9:30 a.m.

Since I wasn’t given press access to the game, Mobile Sports Report attended like a regular fan, purchasing a single ticket through the NFL Ticket Exchange service on the 49ers’ web site. My plan to get to Levi’s from San Mateo was to drive to downtown Mountain View, park there and take VTA the rest of the way. (I didn’t take CalTrain mainly because I didn’t want to have to sync my return schedule with the CalTrain options going northbound on Sunday.)

Though I was somewhat incredulous about having to buy tickets online — VTA said that the ticket machines in Mountain View would be shut down Sunday to keep big lines from forming — upon further review the VTA app was slick and easy to operate and understand. After purchasing a ticket for $6.50 Saturday night I activated it Sunday, and showed it at the gate where they checked boarding passes. For people who didn’t have tickets there was a tent set up where they could buy a pre-loaded Clipper card for $10 good for a day’s worth of VTA riding. There was an abundance of VTA workers on hand, as well as a large and very obvious police presence. As a nice touch there was also a large bank of porta-potties, and behind the trains there were express buses waiting, according to one VTA employee, in case of crowd overloads.

“We learned some lessons from two weeks ago,” he said.

If there was a glitch in the VTA operations it was with the city of Mountain View — though a couple city lots were designated as places where fans could buy all-day parking passes, and there were clear signs to those lots, at 9:30 a.m. those lots were not yet staffed with anyone to pay; MSR found one sign leaning up against a post, waiting to be deployed. Fans could also park in the CalTrain lot for $5, payable via the CalTrain track podium ticket machines.

Fans transferring from CalTrain to VTA at Mtn View station

Fans transferring from CalTrain to VTA at Mtn View station

I boarded the first VTA train to leave for the stadium, along with many fans who had just gotten off CalTrain. The pleasant, air-conditioned trip took just 27 minutes, passing many Silicon Valley company headquarters and one neighborhood with “no parking here” patrols before stopping pretty much right at the Levi’s Stadium entrance. A few steps later I was in the parking lot, and took the first of many Wi-Fi speed tests and got a signal of 29 Mbps download and 23 Mbps upload, a good sign for network operations.

Looking for Wi-Fi, finding lots of it

DAS antenna in "Faithful Mile" area

DAS antenna in “Faithful Mile” area

Once inside the gates — and past the shaded scanners — I started speed testing in earnest, with the two devices I brought with me: A Motorola Droid 4 on Verizon, and a Samsung Galaxy Note 3 on AT&T. While waiting for the main stadium gates to open at 11 a.m. I got the weakest Wi-Fi signals of the day along the “Faithful Mile” area where promotional booths from sponsors kept early arrivers entertained. Wi-Fi on both devices out there only hit 2 to 3 Mbps on the download, while cell signals on both devices were in the 6-7 Mbps download range. Since I could see multiple DAS radios in the area but not any Wi-Fi access points I wasn’t too surprised; but it was an unusual area not to be blanketed with Wi-Fi, especially since there was good access a couple hundred yards away in the parking lots.

After finally entering the stadium proper, I ran into Niners president Paraag Marathe — who said he was “nervously excited,” and looked ready to start sweating in his suit and tie. “We’ve just got to make sure everything works today,” Marathe said, shaking my hand. Then I went up the escalator and saw the “Kezar pub,” an open-air bar filling the top area above the Intel gate. There, draft beers like Shock Top and Goose Island IPA were available for $11, and bottled beers available for $10.25.

As I started walking around the outside concourse I took my first speed test in the stadium and it blew the needle off the edge: 57.92 Mbps download, 41.00 Mbps upload.

A few minutes later on the inside concourse (where most of the concession stands are) I hit 27.85 Mbps/21.34 Mbps, still impressive. Then I tried to launch the app, and — problem. Apparently the device wasn’t connecting because it wouldn’t show my location on the wayfinding app. Luckily, right in front of me was Racquel, one of the “NiNerds,” the team’s new staff of technical experts who are there to help fans make the app work. But Racquel couldn’t solve my problem, even after we both tried turning on all location services, including Bluetooth.

Racquel the NiNerd

Racquel the NiNerd

“I can try to find another NiNerd who might know more about this device,” offered Racquel, who was visibly dismayed at her failure to help solve my problem. Instead, I moved on, hoping that the problem would solve itself later. But it didn’t.

Failure to locate… and other app problems

After downloading the Levi’s app to both devices over the weekend, I noticed that the first item on the app list of functions — Tickets — required me to “sign in” with my “Stadium Ticket Account,” something I didn’t have and didn’t know how to get. I did figure out how to enter my purchased seat location (which I could have used to order food to my seat, or for the express pick-up option), but I could never get the location feature to work on the Samsung device, which kept me from being able to see the live streaming TV option (I kept getting a message that said, “You must be at the stadium to play this video”). I was able to watch the live TV option on the Motorola device, after turing on location services. But for both devices — and, as it turns out, for everyone in the stadium — the final feature on the app, Game Center, where we were supposed to be able to see all the instant replays we could handle, remained labeled “coming soon.”

Finally sitting in my most excellent seat — section 244, row 3, seat 17 — I noticed that the Motorola device could no longer connect to Wi-Fi, even as the Samsung device was hitting marks in the 15-16 Mbps range. I started tweeting about the problem, and instead of a NiNerd coming to help me I got a personal visit from the Levi’s version of a Jedi Master, namely Dan Williams, the team’s vice president of technology. (Never underestimate the power of a complaining tweet!)

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams attempts to fix my Droid 4 Wi-Fi issues (while trying not to laugh at the fact that I actually have and use a Droid 4)

Niners VP of technology Dan Williams attempts to fix my Droid 4 Wi-Fi issues (while trying not to laugh at the fact that I actually have and use a Droid 4)

On my own, I had guessed that the Droid’s inability to connect came from its having only a 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi radio. If you’re not familiar with Wi-Fi networks, the 2.4 GHz band of unlicensed airwaves is what most first-generation Wi-Fi networks used; more recent devices are able to also use the 5 GHz band of unlicensed airwaves, which simply offer more channels and more bandwidth. The iPhone 5s, for example, mainly uses 5 GHz for Wi-Fi, as does my Samsung Note.

In scanning the available Wi-Fi networks, I had also noticed something else that I thought could be gumming up the Droid’s connection — a bunch of personal Wi-Fi hotspots in the immediate area, including several labeled as GoPro cameras. After curiously examining my Droid 4 — and its slide-out keyboard — Williams and a technician from Wi-Fi gear provider Aruba Networks concurred that my device was getting bogged down in the 2.4 GHz mess, and also wasn’t refreshing the available networks list, a device-specific problem.

Bottom line? Levi’s is no country for old phones.

Initial verdict: Wi-Fi and cellular is world class… but app needs work

After staying into the third quarter — and visiting another friend in section 109, where I got another hefty Wi-Fi speed test (24.42/25.39 Mbps) — I followed the lead of many fans and took an early leave of Levi’s, which meant no lines at the VTA trains and just a couple short delays due to track congestion that stretched the return train trip to 40 minutes. Overall, my travel to and from the stadium from San Mateo took just over an hour each way, a happy stat to report.

My initial verdict is that the Wi-Fi and DAS (cellular) networks delivered as promised, with solid speeds all around the stadium every time I checked. It’s no small accomplishment just to deliver such world-class service to such a crowded space, especially in the middle of Silicon Valley. True to its roots, the crowd Sunday was device-happy, with many iPads and GoPros being carried around as video cameras, in addition to all the phones that were in constant use. It’s a tribute to Williams and his staff, as well as the technology suppliers like Aruba, Brocade, Comcast (backbone bandwidth supplier) and DAS Group Professionals, who built the distributed antenna system (DAS) which brings advanced cellular connectivity inside the gates, to have built a solid network that worked well on its first big test.

The team app, however, did not even come close to living up to its advanced billing. To equal the network I think the app needs more advance instructions, especially on the ticketing/registration options as well as on the location services needed to make everything work. And until we see the multiple-camera angle live replays in action, to me the app is an incomplete project. The good news is, the Niners and their technology teams have several weeks to make improvements, including another preseason game Aug. 24 against the San Diego Chargers.

It’d also be helpful for the team to reach out a bit more to the VTA and players like the City of Mountain View, since the VTA site maps and Mountain View’s parking maps are far from what you would call “advanced design.” I think it’s up to the Niners to help pay for improvements to the city and transportation entities’ technology offerings, simply because of the burden placed on those operators by the fans going to Niners’ games. At the very least, more links from football to getting-there operations seems in order, instead of trusting that all parts of the operation will work in sync.

VTA lines going home

VTA lines going home

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