Improve employee productivity, lower costs, and simplify network management.

Whether building a new integrated network or retrofitting an existing wired network, many small and medium-size businesses find that a combined wired-wireless approach provides the strong points of both technologies: the mobility of wireless and the control and speed of wired networks. Integration can also:

• Lower deployment costs compared to setting up a separate wireless network
• Reduce management costs
• Increase employee productivity

To balance their needs, a growing number of businesses are:

• Using wireless to provide building- and campuswide network access to an array of mobile and fixed devices
• Relying on traditional wired LANs for high-throughput services and LAN distribution to the wireless access points

Build on the Strengths of a Wired Network

As it looked into networking its new six-floor, 300,000-square-foot headquarters in New York last year, hip-hop apparel powerhouse Ecko Unlimited realized that it wasn’t ready to abandon wired technology. Network speed is critical for organizations like Ecko that send large files, such as advertising layouts, between users’ computers and servers.

“As we looked to serve our mobile users, we also needed to maintain a certain performance level for our desktop workers,” says Sarah Casalan, Ecko's vice president of IT and e-commerce.

“You start with your wired network and then add access points,” says Mike Hronek, a networking specialist for CDW Corp., a Cisco Premier Certified Partner in Illinois. “On the wired network, you have the router, servers, switches, printers, and other devices,” he explains. "The wireless network is then spun off the wired network from a switch with a direct Ethernet line.”

Companies that already have a wired network can simply add wireless capabilities onto the existing infrastructure. In addition to providing roaming employees with network access, an integrated network with wireless capabilities lets companies deploy powerful new mobile technologies, such as wireless voice-over-IP (VoIP) handsets and radio-frequency identification (RFID) for asset tracking in offices, stores, and warehouses.

“An integrated network simplifies things,” says Kenneth Dulaney, vice president and analyst at research firm Gartner. “Instead of worrying about managing and securing individual networks, you can handle everything under a single umbrella." An integrated network also expands easily, so you can use wireless to reach locations that are too large or too far away to connect cost-effectively with wires.

Simplify Deployment and Management

Ecko was fortunate to be able to create its integrated network from scratch because it was remodeling the building. Planning began in June 2004. The firm chose Calence, LLC, a Cisco Gold Certified Partner, to help design and deploy the network.

With the network design completed in November 2004, the network was ready for deployment the following month when the new headquarters opened. Ecko works with Calence for ongoing network management.

While Ecko has yet to calculate its overall ROI, the network has already proven its value by reducing telephony expenses. Casalan estimates that phone costs were cut by about a third by switching from a traditional PBX to VoIP technology.

Gain New Capabilities, Cost Savings

While it's ideal to build an integrated network from the outset, most companies find themselves wanting to add wireless to an existing wired network. Until last year, E.L. Johnson Investigations, a private-detective agency in Chicago, depended on a small, peer-to-peer wired network.

CDW designed and built an integrated network that gives the detective agency's 10 deskbound office staff fast, reliable wired network service, while giving its 10 field investigators wireless connectivity. Previously, the investigators had to share a single desktop computer on the wired network.

The project, from planning to deployment, took only a couple of months, including only about a week of onsite installation work. Day-to-day management has also been easy because the small network is simple enough to essentially run itself.

Stacey Johnson, the company's executive vice president, notes that one of the greatest things about the network is that it treats deskbound and mobile users equally.

Johnson calculates that by eliminating overtime, reducing third-party support, and increasing employee productivity, the new technology will save the company $60,000 per year. Cost for network hardware, the bulk of the project’s cost, totaled only $65,000.