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WLAN
grows in the Indian corporate psyche
The
Indian corporate is gradually waking up to the obvious cost,
deployment, management and other benefits of wireless LANs
in the enterprise.
Come
the new millennium and vendors are ready to renew their
efforts to push wireless networking technologies in the
Indian market. Reason: the market seems more conducive to
deploying such offerings. Over the last few months there
has been an obvious sense of openness regarding wireless
networking technology among the IT managers of the big corporates
in the country.
With
802.11b standard gaining ground in the industry, wireless
networking is becoming an accepted norm for networking.
It has become faster and costs have gone down effectively.
Today with the 802.11b standard, users can use the 2.4 Ghz
ISM radio band to get a throughput of 11Mbps over air. This
is convincing many managers today to go for this technology.
More and more top-level executives are being given WLAN
connectivity so that they can access information from anywhere
without bothering for physical plugging. It can provide
LAN users access to real time information anywhere in their
organization. The flexibility of anywhere linking is being
promoted as a new approach to increasing productivity and
service opportunities.
Another
factor that most vendors are stressing on is the security
aspect of wireless LANs. The 802.11b standard includes a
security technique that uses encryption algorithm that is
difficult to break in. Prem K Menon, Regional Business Director,
Ericsson Enterprise Systems, which recently launched its
WLAN products in the country, says, "Today WLAN can
be more secure than the wired LAN as this combines both
the security aspect of the wired LAN as well as the security
provided by the standards within the radio frequency."
Going
by the international market trends, WLANs are fast being
deployed in health care, retail, manufacturing etc. They
are obviously experiencing the benefits that accrue from
flexibility of using any kind of hand held terminals, notebooks
and desktops to transmit real-time information to centralized
hosts for processing, thus increasing efficiency and productivity.
With
various WLAN products available from Lucent, 3Com, Cisco,
Ericsson and others, more and more IT managers are opening
up to the idea of implementing wireless LAN within the organization
especially because despite the increase in space requirement,
cables cannot be stretched. Talking about the state of implementation
of WLANs within the country, Vivek Mahajan, Director, Infotec
Network Systems, New Delhi, informs, "We are helping
at least three to four customers deploy WLANs. As a matter
of fact, most of them are trying out pilots for WLANs right
now."
In
fact vendors such as Cisco, which has introduced its AiroNet
solutions for WLANs is also currently working out the mechanics
for a pilot project within its own organization. Adds S
V Ramana, Country South East Manager, Cisco, India, "Once
we set up WLAN within our premise, it will act as a proof
of concept for our customers. The wireless access solutions
that we are offering are viable for enterprises, small and
medium businesses in the country."
Though
the enterprises have accepted the technology, complement
to their existing networks. Says Pankaj Sinha, Manager,
IT, Maurya Sheraton and Towers, New Delhi, "We would
look at it as complementing or extending the existing infrastructure."
S
R Balasubramanian, GM-Information Systems, Hero Honda Motors
Ltd., "WLAN system can be fast and easy a In case a
company wants to extend its network without ripping the
walls of its office premises apart, wireless offers a great
alternative. "
In
fact, Ranbaxy Laboratories is seriously chalking out plans
to deploy a full fledged WLAN as the IT Manager, Vijay Sethi
has realized the cost effectiveness of a WLAN when expanding
the premise or the network. Says Ramana , "The initial
cost of deploying WLAN can be more than wired LANs but having
a fixed infrastructure could be a non recoverable investment,
while the organization can redeploy the WLAN."
Today,
WLAN has become popular as installation is very simple and
bandwidth offered is nearly on par with the ones available
on the wired networks. IT managers are actually going past
the initial cost and looking at WLANs. They are also realizing
that managing a WLAN within the organization is not more
difficult. "Troubleshooting WLANs can be easier as
maximum trouble can come from interference between the access-points
within the building or between the access device and the
access-point. But IT managers feel that they need to monitor
this more than a wired LAN," says Ramana, points out.
Despite
newness and apprehension about adopting, both vendors and
IT managers convey that WLAN is a technology option that
is flexible, reliable, secure and cost effective in the
long run. As the awareness increases and demand starts growing,
the Indian market can see a lot more WLAN products and solutions
and real time deployments in the coming months. NM
Priyanka
Bhattacharya, priyanka_b@email.com
