NRG Stadium Wi-Fi ready for Super Bowl LI

January 3, 2017 by Paul Kapustka Leave a Comment

NRG Stadium. Credit: Houston Texans Instagram

Nonexistent a year ago, the new Wi-Fi network at Houston’s NRG Stadium has at least one more live game that administrators can use as a final tune-up before the venue and its wireless infrastructure host Super Bowl LI on Feb. 5.

Live since the start of the current NFL season, the Wi-Fi network deployed by integrator 5 Bars using Extreme Networks Wi-Fi gear has seen growth in fan usage for each subsequent game, according to David Moore, manager of information services for NRG Park.

“The first few games [of the season] it wasn’t heavily promoted, but as we went on usage shot up,” said Moore in a recent phone interview. Though he wouldn’t release specific figures on data use, Moore said that game-day totals near the end of the season saw in the range of 25,000 unique users per game, with data totals in the “4-5 terabyte” range. The stadium’s main tenants, the Houston Texans, will have at least one more home game this weekend when they host the Oakland Raiders in the first round of the NFL playoffs.

Under seat APs visible down seating row. Credit: 5 Bars

While it’s possible that the Texans could be hosting the AFC Championship game if all the higher-seed teams lose en route, this weekend’s game is most likely the last chance the NRG Stadium tech team will have as a dress rehearsal for the Super Bowl. Since the Super Bowl is historically the biggest single-day data-usage event — and has gotten bigger every year — all technical eyes will be on the NRG Stadium network, which only started becoming a reality after the stadium hosted last year’s men’s NCAA basketball Final Four. With a base seating capacity of 72,220, NRG’s Super Bowl crowd should roughly be the same as last year’s at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif.

Fast deployment schedule met

“It was a challenge [to deploy so quickly] and we are still working out the tuning,” said Michelle McKenna-Doyle, the NFL’s chief information officer, in an email interview. “We were fortunate to have the regular season to work on it, but hope to have it Super Bowl ready within next couple weeks. 5 Bars, Extreme Networks, The Texans, Harris County and the host committee all worked hard to make it a reality for our fans.”

At one point in recent history, it seemed like NRG might never get a fan-facing Wi-Fi network since the county-owned facility couldn’t find the budget necessary to bring wireless connectivity to the venue. But with the Super Bowl approaching, a consensus finally pushed through, with 5 Bars winning a deployment bid that still needed a change in equipment from Ruckus (the original supplier in the 5 Bars bid) to Extreme. While no official breakdown of funding shares has been supplied, the reported $6 million-plus cost of the Wi-Fi deployment was likely shared in some fashion by the Texans, the NFL, Verizon Wireless and Extreme.

Ready for the playoffs and Super Bowl! Credit: 5 Bars

According to Moore, Verizon chipped in to secure guaranteed offload for its cellular customers, as well as its own SSID that will automatically sign on Verizon customers in the facility, a tactic used by Verizon in several other NFL stadiums. Non-Verizon customer fans can use a free xfinitywifi SSID, as Comcast is the backbone supplier for the Wi-Fi network services.

According to Moore there are 1,250 Extreme Wi-Fi APs in the venue now, with 550 of those deployed under seats in the main bowl. While Moore said the under-seat location allows for much denser deployment and better network tuning, the method also caused the most headaches during deployment, beyond the usual cost and struggle of drilling through concrete floors.

First of all, the installers had to bring all the necessary power and cabling infrastructure in, since there was nothing underneath the concrete seat floors, Moore said. In fact, because there are offices underneath some of the seating areas, contractors had to negotiate a “drip pan” that kept moisture from seating power-washing away from the office roofing.

Another “big hiccup” emerged when the original equipment used for the under-seat locations didn’t lock out all the moisture, leading to a full replacement of all the 550 under-seat APs. Moore said the under-seat locations now use Extreme’s highest-grade outdoor-rated AP, the 3965i.

New DAS installed last year

Since Super Bowls also typically set records for cellular DAS usage, it’s no surprise that Verizon also recently updated the DAS at NRG Stadium, reportedly putting $12 million into a new system installed before the 2015 season. According to Moore, the DAS and the Wi-Fi also cover parking areas outside the venue, including a plaza where the Texans typically see 6,000 or more fans gathering before games.

“There’s great coverage” in the parking lots with the new DAS, Moore said. Announcements have not yet been made public, but you can expect that both AT&T and Verizon are busy beefing up the cellular systems in and around the stadium, as typical before any big public event.

With the dust finally settled, Texans fans and the soon-to-arrive Super Bowl fans will have good connectivity for the big day, due in no small part to the efforts of 5 Bars, which Moore complimented repeatedly for the company’s persistence and effort.

According to Moore 5 Bars had brought semi-trailers full of equipment to town ahead of the Final Four, and even used the floor of the old Houston Astrodome to roll out network inventory.

“They were working under the gun, with a limited amount of time to get it done,” said Moore of 5 Bars.

Filed Under: 4G LTE, AT&T, DAS, Extreme Networks, Levi's Stadium, NFL, Super Bowl, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi Tagged With: 4G LTE, AT&T, DAS, Extreme Networks, Levi's Stadium, Mobile Sports Report, NFL, Paul Kapustka, Stadium Wi-Fi, Super Bowl, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi

Seahawks see 4.1 TB of Wi-Fi usage for Monday Night game vs. Bills

November 15, 2016 by Paul Kapustka Leave a Comment

Seahawks fans at CenturyLink Field during Nov. 7 game. Credit: Seahawks.com

With the Seahawks starting to gain momentum for another playoff push, the Wi-Fi network at their home of CenturyLink Field is getting a good workout as well, with 4.10 terabytes of data used during Seattle’s 31-25 win over the Buffalo Bills on Nov. 7.

The Monday Night Football game, an exciting, close contest, also saw a total of 35,808 unique clients and a peak concurrent user number of 23,281 on the Extreme Networks-powered Wi-Fi network at the stadium, according to Seahawks IT officials. The game set an attendance record for CenturyLink Seahawks games, with 69,084 in the seats, breaking the old record of 69,080 from last season.

According to information from all the games so far this season (see below), the CenturyLink Field Wi-Fi has been seeing strong and growing usage, with unique numbers starting out in the high 20,000-user level and edging up each week. Upload totals also seem to be growing, with maybe the team’s improved record as the impetus.

Filed Under: 4G LTE, DAS, Extreme Networks, NFL, Seattle Seahwaks, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi Tagged With: 4G LTE, Buffalo Bills, CenturyLink Field, DAS, Extreme Networks, Mobile Sports Report, Monday Night Football, NFL, Paul Kapustka, Seattle Seahawks, Stadium Wi-Fi, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi

Pacers get new Wi-Fi network from Ruckus to replace SignalShare

October 24, 2016 by Paul Kapustka Leave a Comment

The Indiana Pacers have signed a 3-year deal with Ruckus Wireless and Wi-Fi analytics and deployment firm Purple to put a new Wi-Fi network into Bankers Life Fieldhouse, the home of both the NBA’s Pacers and the WNBA’s Indiana Fever.

The new network, which the firms said would use 437 Ruckus Wi-Fi APs, will replace a Wi-Fi network installed at Bankers Life Fieldhouse by SignalShare, a Wi-Fi deployment firm that recently went bankrupt in the middle of legal issues that alleged fraudulent practices. According to Ruckus, the new network should be live by early December; stay tuned for a more thorough profile of the new deployment.

So far, all of the teams that we’ve contacted who were caught up in the SignalShare snafu (under which some of the network leases were being offered for auction before the SignalShare bankruptcy put a halt to things) seem to be coming out of the mess OK. The Jacksonville Jaguars have a new manager for their Wi-Fi network, and the Pacers will have a new Ruckus-gear network.

It’s still a little unclear as to what is happening at the Golden State Warriors’ Oracle Arena, but press representatives there said the building will have an Extreme Networks Wi-Fi deployment up and running for this season; previously, SignalShare had run the network using Extreme gear so our best guess is that Extreme somehow took over the SignalShare lease. Neither the Warriors nor Extreme would comment on any SignalShare matters.

In Indianapolis, the press release said that Purple, previously known as Purple WiFi (a “cloud-based marketing and analytics WiFi software company,” according to the firm), will be providing analytics from the Wi-Fi network to the Pacers. Terms of the deal were not diclosed, so it is unknown if Purple is paying for the Wi-Fi gear and making money off analytics and advertising sales; again, stay tuned for more details when we speak to the Pacers IT team in more detail.

Filed Under: Basketball, Extreme Networks, Golden State Warriors, NBA, Wi-Fi Tagged With: Bankers Life Fieldhouse, Brocade, Extreme Networks, Indiana Pacers, Mobile Sports Report, NBA, Paul Kapustka, Ruckus Wireless, SignalShare, Stadium Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi

Bills, Sabres owners embrace fans through unified ‘One Buffalo’ app feature

October 21, 2016 by Terry Sweeney 3 Comments

Screenshot of the MyOneBuffalo app.

If Pegula Sports and Entertainment, owners of the NFL’s Buffalo Bills and the NHL’s Sabres franchises, had one message for fans, it might be “We’ve got you covered.”

With its recently launched MyOneBuffalo app, Pegula has integrated electronic tickets, venue information (parking, concessions, restrooms) and player data, as well as some video extras for the Bills’ version. But MyOneBuffalo also features a digital wallet along with a loyalty program access, where the points and features are automated – scanned or activated by proximity to in-venue iBeacons, rather than via input manually by fans. Inaudible tone technology in the app will be able to detect when fans are tuned in to a game on TV and credit them for watching (provided a fan has enabled location services for the app). MyOneBuffalo also has a “Find Friends” function that allows fans to connect with Facebook friends during games or other events.

Most of that is pretty standard fare for pro team apps. Where MyOneBuffalo distinguishes itself is on the backend. It’s integrated on Venuetize’s mobile platform, which hosts a variety of functionality from Authorize.net (PCI-compliant payment processing); Delaware North (hospitality, food service management); Experience (fan upgrade software); Micros (Oracle’s point-of-sale system); Radius Networks (iBeacons, geo-fences); Skidata (loyalty rewards portal); Ticketmaster and Tickets.com (ticketing systems); TruCa$h (physical gift cards); RetailPro (merchandise POS system); and YinzCam (mobile app development).

Higher expectations for fans

After traveling to lots of NFL and NHL games, owner Kim Pegula challenged her management staff to meet fans’ higher expectations of the venues, technology and their relationship to the team, according to John Durbin, director of marketing for Pegula Sports and Entertainment. “The impetus behind MyOneBuffalo was enhancing the fan experience,” he told Mobile Sports Report.

Bills and Sabres owner Kim Pegula. Credit: Bill Wippert

Venuetize is hosting three versions of MyOneBuffalo: One for the Bills, a second for the Sabres, and a standalone version, which can be used by either visitors to the HarborCenter entertainment district, fans at home, or supporters of the Buffalo Bandits, the city’s National Lacrosse League franchise (also owned by Pegula).

Like other owner-managers of professional sports teams, Pegula is looking to MyOneBuffalo to gain deeper insights about fans’ movement, behavior and spending.

“They [Pegula Sports and Entertainment] are trying to get the 360-degree view of the fan,” said Karri Zaremba, founder and chief operations officer of Venuetize. “They wanted a mobile app that would work seamlessly across all their properties and brands.”

Once fully deployed, MyOneBuffalo will provide more insights to attendance numbers, assess the impact of various campaigns and initiatives, and measure purchasing patterns, social activity and any correlations. This is fertile ground for the application of predictive analytics, a holy grail in business at the moment, not just in sports and entertainment, to allow organizations to anticipate better, save money and delight customers, or in this case, fans.

“When we started to align our business operations with the Bills, we had a lot of different data sources across our entities, so one challenge was that we had no way to connect dots between someone going to lots of Bills and Sabres games,” Durbin said. “So to have an analytics platform that collects all this data and know that it’s the same fan gives us data to make their experience more customized—and a better experience, quite honestly.”

Adding restaurants and retail to game-day experiences

Network upgrades have been recently completed at New Era Field (formerly Ralph Wilson Stadium) where the Bills play; KeyBank Center for the Sabres; and the adjacent HarborCenter, a hockey-themed, mixed-use development that includes a Marriott hotel, a two-story restaurant-bar with flatscreens everywhere, and lots of retail, that opened in 2014. “The trend that’s happening right now is these entertainment districts for teams with restaurants and retail,” Durbin explained. “We’re trying to create a seamless experience across these three venues. We wanted an app with similar features, regardless of which location you’re at.”

KeyBank Center, home of the Sabres. Credit: Bill Wippert

MyOneBuffalo taps six different location-based technologies: beacons; geo-fences; inaudible tones; Wi-Fi; image recognition; and wearables – MyOneBuffalo is integrated with FitBit.

Inaudible tones can be used in a couple different ways. They can be played through the public address system or the software developer’s kit can detect it so that it triggers something. Inaudible tones can be used for basic data collection or more interactive features, where a sponsor offers a premium. “We’re still working through ways to use the inaudible tone,” Durbin said. “We don’t have a clear timetable as to when that will be available.”

The Pegula organization is looking at other ways to tap MyOneBuffalo. At the top of that list is reducing wait times for gates or concessions and re-directing fans to ones that are less busy, Durbin said. They’re also looking at methods to pre-order concessions or merchandise so a fan doesn’t have to wait in line; they can walk up later, scan their receipt and walk away with their order. “We want to add features and create a robust experience for fans,” Durbin said.

Filed Under: Apps, Extreme Networks, NFL, NHL, Wi-Fi Tagged With: Apps, Buffalo Bills, Buffalo Sabres, Mobile Sports Report, New Era Field, Pegula Sports and Entertainment, Stadium Wi-Fi, Terry Sweeney, Venutize, Wi-Fi

Analysis: The year of the big stadium Wi-Fi upgrade

October 3, 2016 by Paul Kapustka Leave a Comment

Carolina Panthers director of IT James Hammond shows off a new under-seat Wi-Fi AP at Bank of America Stadium. Credit: Carolina Panthers

Even in the midst of several brand-new stadium debuts and the future-proofed wireless networks inside them, there is a separate, yet distinct trend emerging in the big-stadium, wireless connectivity world: Call it the year of the big upgrade.

Our profile in our latest STADIUM TECH REPORT of Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, N.C., is a case in point: Thanks to the never-ending demand for more connectivity for fans, stadiums that deployed networks just a few years ago are now finding that those old systems already need upgrades or replacements, typically at a much higher cost than the original network. In addition to BofA Stadium, the New England Patriots’ home, Gillette Stadium, also got a Wi-Fi makeover this past summer, going from about 400 Wi-Fi APs to well over a thousand, with most of the new ones deployed under seats.

According to Fred Kirsch, who oversees the Gillette Stadium network, some of the under-seat placements there were especially tricky, since granite underneath the stands didn’t allow for the ability to drill through the concrete. A workaround involving an above-ground enclosure was envisioned and manufactured, underlining the custom complexity of network deployment found from stadium to stadium. No two are the same, and what works at one may or may not work at another.

But what is common across all these large venues is the ever-increasing need for bandwidth, a moving target that has yet to slow down or stabilize. Last year the story that turned everyone’s head was the need by carriers to upgrade their DAS infrastructure at Levi’s Stadium ahead of Super Bowl 50 – this coming just a year after the stadium had opened for business. While the demands of a Super Bowl (especially Super Bowl 50, which set records for DAS and Wi-Fi usage) are perhaps much different than everyday events, it’s still a safe bet that for many stadiums with Wi-Fi networks – especially the early movers – 2016 has become a year of reckoning, or biting the bullet and writing more checks for more coverage, perhaps seemingly too soon after the initial rollout.

Getting ready for Super Bowl LI

In Houston, NRG Stadium finally has Wi-Fi, and not a moment too soon, with Super Bowl LI on the near horizon. Since the venue didn’t have Wi-Fi prior to this season it’s not really an upgrade but it’s hard to understate the challenge of putting in a Super Bowl-ready network in just one summer, a construction calendar shortened by the fact that integrator 5 Bars and equipment vendor Extreme Networks had to wait until after the NCAA Men’s Final Four was over to begin installing cabling and APs. At of the start of the NFL season the Wi-Fi network is already live at NRG Stadium, and is sure to go through weekly tweaks as the league marches on toward its championship game.

Gillette Stadium before the Sept. 11 game vs. the Miami Dolphins. Credit: Steve Milne, AP, via Patriots.com

And while attention-grabbing new stadiums like US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis and Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta are planning big network capacity from the get-go, some new stadiums like T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas have upgrade thinking planned in from the start, with the idea that the network will never really be a finished product, at least until they stop making new phones or developing new apps. Of course, that future isn’t happening anytime soon, with the Apple iPhone 7 announcement with the new double-lens camera coming in just before the start of another football season.

New phones and new apps mean more bandwidth demands, leading even those who already have stadium networks to keep wondering if what they’ve installed is enough. We suspect this may be an ongoing story line for the foreseeable future, so – stay tuned here to Mobile Sports Report for the latest success stories and lessons learned from those who have already jumped in or jumped back in to the deployment fray.

Editor’s note: This column is from our latest STADIUM TECH REPORT, which is available for free download from our site. Read about Wi-Fi deployments at Bank of America Stadium, Mercedes-Benz Stadium and more!

Filed Under: 4G LTE, AT&T, Cisco, DAS, Extreme Networks, Levi's Stadium, NFL, Super Bowl, VenueNext, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi Tagged With: 4G LTE, AT&T, Atlanta Falcons, Bank of America Stadium, Carolina Panthers, DAS, Extreme Networks, Levi's Stadium, Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Mobile Sports Report, NFL, Paul Kapustka, San Francisco 49ers, Stadium Wi-Fi, Super Bowl, Super Bowl 50, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi

Jaguars get out of SignalShare deal, turn to PCM for EverBank Field Wi-Fi management

September 28, 2016 by Paul Kapustka Leave a Comment

Pregame activity at EverBank Field last weekend. Credit: Jaguars.com.

When Wi-Fi design and implementation firm SignalShare legally imploded earlier this year, one of the biggest questions that surfaced was — what would happen to teams and stadiums who had contracted with SignalShare to run their Wi-Fi networks? The Jacksonville Jaguars, who a couple years ago announced big plans with SignalShare, have gotten out of their contract with the now-bankrupt SignalShare and have turned to integrator PCM to manage the Wi-Fi network at EverBank Field, team officials said.

Mike Webb, director of IT with the Jaguars, said in a phone interview that the team was “able to terminate” its 3-year deal with SignalShare with help from Wi-Fi gear provider Extreme, which was part of the original deal. PCM has also teamed up with Extreme to run the Wi-Fi network at the Tennessee Titans’ Nissan Stadium. Neither SignalShare nor NFS Leasing has responded to any queries about the legal actions; Extreme Networks has also refused to comment on any specifics of any SignalShare-related deals.

While the original deal called for big plans to bring exclusive content to fans at EverBank Field via SignalShare’s portal software, Webb said that currently there is no stadium-specific or game-day app for Jaguars fans. He also said that Comcast sponsors the Wi-Fi connection (as it does at many other stadiums), with fans logging on by connecting to the xfintitywifi SSID.

Adding more APs for patios, new construction

Currently, EverBank Field has 650 Extreme Wi-Fi APs in the venue, with approximately 450 of those in the seating bowl, Webb said. Over the past offseason, the stadium added Wi-Fi coverage to five new areas, mainly patios outside club areas as well as to the South end zone tunnel, which will eventually connect to the theater that is being built outside the stadium.

For the lower level of seating, Webb said Wi-Fi APs are installed in railing enclosures, while higher-level seats are served by overhead mounts. While Webb said the network initially “had some issues” with 2.4 GHz band activity, the addition of more 5 GHz capacity helped to “vastly increase performance.” The Wi-Fi network now regularly sees 14,000 connections per game, Webb said.

More cellular capacity is also on the way to EverBank Field, as Webb said that two (unnamed) wireless carriers have agreed on a plan to build a DAS in the facility for outside seating coverage.

Filed Under: Apps, DAS, Extreme Networks, NFL, Wi-Fi, Xfinity Tagged With: 4G LTE, DAS, EverBank Field, Extreme Networks, Jacksonville Jaguars, Mobile Sports Report, NFL, NFS Leasing, Paul Kapustka, PCM, SignalShare, Stadium Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi