Enhanced Network Deployment and Management – Bart Giordano, CommScope

This is Textron tv. Hey everyone. Welcome back to Textron tv.

You know, a few weeks ago when we were lucky enough to have this gentleman, Bargi Orano from Comscope with us here, uh, they're the folks behind Ruckus. We're gonna talk more about that in a second. But, um, we, we had Bard on, and he would, it was a great story about the, uh, Prada Luna Rosa raising racing team and, and how, you know, what they're doing with Rku and, and to help Yeah.

Kind of cutting edge. People don't realize how it driven competitive car racing is, right? I mean, yeah, that's the coolest crap factor, you know, being involved in a racing team.

I company I had started, we, we had a NASCAR relationship going back 15 years, just being able to go, go by the pit crew and, you know, on the inside and everything. It was, it was kind of like, I felt like a little boy, you know? Uh, it was crazy.

But be that as it may, you could go check that interview out on Textron tv. Bart is back though to tell us about some interesting new developments around Ruckus, and, um, I think you're gonna like it. Bart, welcome back to Textron tv.

How are you? Thanks, Alan. It's great to be here again.

Great. Um, I'm not gonna make you repeat the story we talked about off, off camera about your adventures in Toronto and Las Vegas. Thank You.

But that being said, let you know what there are people out here saying. Hmm. CommScope not sure.

I know those guys ruckus. Yeah. I, I, I remember hearing something about it.

Uh, I think I know what that is, but Bart, for the, for our folks at home here, give us the background. Sure. CommScope is, uh, connectivity powerhouse, right?

Anytime you access the internet, it more than, uh, likely you're using technology provided by CommScope, whether that's the copper and fiber cabling that the signals are, are, um, running over or, you know, the c p E equipment in your house that provides your connectivity to your service provider. And in the case of Ruckus, we're the enterprise networking arm of CommScope providing world class solutions to create connectivity experiences for enterprises around the world, places like hotels and large venues, and, um, educational institutions, et cetera. Excellent.

And, and Bart, um, for people who maybe right off the bat say, geez, I, I'd like to know the website if I want to find out more about CommScope and Ruckus. Sure. Where, where do you send them?

Yeah. com to learn about CommScope solutions, and if you're looking for information specific to Ruckus, you can find us at Ruckus networks do com. And that is R U K U S, I believe?

Correct. com. Yep.

Spelling looks never my thing. I'm sorry. Just, just look for the dog.

Yeah. Okay. Fair enough.

And, and Bart, one final thing before we jump into today's kind of, uh, itinerary, um, your position with Ruckus and CommScope. Sure. So I lead what we call the Networking Intelligence, cellular and Security Solutions division of CommScope.

CommScope is organized across five business segments and in what we call the Nix segment. There are three business units. One is our, uh, Comscope century IOT device security solutions business unit.

We have an intelligent cellular business unit that comprises of our era Digital das platform, and one cell small cell cellular portfolio. And finally, ruckus Networks for which I'm also the general manager. Excellent.

I love it. All right, Bart, I'm, I'm, thank you for providing us all of that kind of background information. Let's jump in some recent, recent announcements, recent new product features you bet coming out of Ruckus.

Uh, sh if you don't mind, share it with our audience. I'd be happy to. So, uh, last time we spoke, we talked about the Ruckus Cloud platform, right?

Mm-hmm. Cloud-based management for disparate enterprise networks, um, around the globe. We've evolved that now into a new offering we call Ruckus One.

And the way to think about Ruckus One, it's the culmination of all the best elements of Ruckus, including our AI driven network and service assurance platform into one unified portal that allows increasingly enterprise complex networks to be managed through a single pane of glass. Love it. So where do we go from here now?

Well, if you think about, um, you know, some of the trends in, in enterprise networking, we talked about the complexity. And in order to address some of that, you know, these networks generate a tremendous amount of, of data. And traditionally, um, managing and troubleshooting those networks was a very time intensive, um, process.

As you sort through data trying to identify where network anomalies may exist, I think one of the things that those of us that have been in the wifi industry appreciate, uh, is that every network issue presents itself to the user as well. The wifi is broken, right? And more often than not, you know, there's an issue somewhere deep in the network.

Your internet might be down. Um, you may not be able to reach your DMS servers, you might have a D H C P address issue. And, um, the challenge of, of sorting out where the real network challenge exists or where the anomaly nest exists in the network can now be addressed using data science and artificial intelligence to automate that process.

And that's what the Ruckus One platform offers. Regardless of the complexity of the network, uh, the amount of data that that is being generated in the network, we're able to use artificial intelligence now to detect anomalies in the network. Oftentimes before a user experiences, um, uh, that anomaly, we're able to prioritize those issues for the, um, IT team.

We're able to, um, determine the, uh, performance of a network, you know, before users show up. So that if you're a managed service provider and you have a hard SLA requirement that you, uh, need to meet in that network, you can have confidence based on our service assurance capabilities that that network is going to perform when your users show up in a stadium or an arena for a big event or in a classroom, um, for instruction that day. Excellent.

Um, so let, let's talk from a user point of view now, though. Sure. Right?

It, it's a single pane plane of glass. It, it, it kind of bring, it takes away, you know, I call it the desensitization factor of just information overload, but, you know, so if you're a typical, you know, enterprise corporate user out here, like what, uh, what are the, the telltale signs, if you will, that says, you know what, I should look into this. Sure.

I think, you know, the use cases that we find in the enterprise are evolving, right? The traditional use case is, um, a user and, you know, their suite of devices comes into a campus environment or a venue, and, you know, they're using, um, connectivity for access to corporate resources and the internet, et cetera, to, to get their job done. But enterprises and certain industries, um, are in the process of digital transformation.

And in many cases, we're seeing new classes of devices come on the network. And that's why we've introduced this concept of a multi-access public and private network. So we no longer can assume that the only devices coming on the network are traditional wired ethernet devices or wifi devices for users.

There's lots of things coming on the network. Those might be iot sensors, things like thermostats. Um, in the hospitality industry, we're connecting door locks to the network, and oftentimes they're coming in over, um, uh, access technologies other than wifi, maybe Bluetooth or, or, or ZigBee.

And in places like factories, um, or in, in agriculture, you know, there's use cases where you need to provide very broad coverage or you need to consider mobility, right? So things moving around in your environment, automated guided vehicles and robotics and so forth. And there's an opportunity then to introduce, uh, cellular solutions to the enterprise, right?

Traditionally in the domain of mobile network operators. But these use cases, um, you know, maybe are, are better suited for, um, cellular than they are for, for wifi if you're thinking about covering, um, acreage for a farm or millions of square feet of a, a distribution center. And so, as these new devices are coming into the network, obviously the complexity of those networks is increasing dramatically.

And the Ruckus One platform is meant to address that complexity by enabling you to manage iot traditional, uh, wifi and, and, and wired, uh, ethernet devices as well as private cellular services through this unified portal. And again, leverage artificial intelligence in order to be able to manage, troubleshoot that network and also receive business intelligence, right? Understand what's going on in your network to help you better serve your users and operate your campus environment more efficiently.

Love it. I love it. All right.

So you convinced someone out there, they want to, they wanna, how do, where do I sign? How do I get on here? What's the on ramp here Bar?

Yeah, certainly. I, I, I think the other, um, thing to point out is, you know, consuming all of this technology into an enterprise, um, can be quite capital intensive, right? And so one of the things to think about is the changing consumption model, um, that we've all become accustomed to in this subscription economy, right?

I mean, you want to acquire a new service. You can either pay for it all upfront or pay as you go. And so along with the Ruckus One platform and the multi access, public and private networking, uh, solution, we are also, uh, adopting this networking as a service consumption model where we can wrap all of the solution up into, uh, you know, the hardware, the software, the service, the installation, the design and support into, um, uh, an OPEX model where you can pay as you go rather than, rather than, uh, pay for everything upfront.

And so, uh, you know, if, if you're interested in, in learning more, you can come to our website, you can reach out to one of our partners, right? We sell through a vast network of, of channel partners around the world who provide world-class services and are really excited about, uh, this platform, which is sort of, uh, purpose-built for, uh, a managed services environment. And we'll be happy to give you more information and get you, get you going with Ruckus One.

Absolutely. Very cool. Now, if I mischaracterize this, Bart, please correct me.

Ruckus one is kind of the culmination of, of several of these different Yeah. Feature releases and stuff, but now you, you've kind of solidified it all under one, no, no pun, hence the name Ruckus one. Yeah, we got it all under 1, 1, 1 umbrella.

There's more here though, yes or no. Yeah. Well, I think, you know, ruckus, uh, our portfolio since I joined when we were Ruckus Wireless and we delivered really great wifi to Enterprises has, has expanded dramatically both through, um, acquisitions we've done, as well as a lot of organic development around our iot platform and around things like private cellular services and, uh, the AI driven analytics solution.

And these persisted, you know, well on their own, uh, but were acquired as, uh, you know, separate products. And so Ruckus one is the culmination of all that. We integrate iot, we integrate network management, we integrate, um, AI ops through our, um, uh, ruckus analytics platform, zero Trust, uh, enterprise networking, et cetera, all in, uh, cloud service that operates at very high scale and, um, is really, um, you know, again, purpose built to enable our partners to deliver these services while recognizing that the preferred consumption model for these services is evolving toward the subscription economy Like everything else, right?

It's a sassy Exactly. Ops some people call it. And, and so really what we're talking about is this is can be consumed, I guess you, you guys coined the term not me here, right?

Network as a service. That's right. Yeah.

It's a very flexible, it's a very flexible model. Um, you know, for, for IT organizations or managed service providers that have operational networks, but are now expanding to things like IOT or private cellular for which, you know, they may not have an existing skillset. Um, and there's a steep learning curve around we can come in through this networking as a service solution and enable that partner to expand their capabilities and expand their offering into, uh, their customer base and enable enterprises to do more with their network without the complexity of having to understand how to operate private cellular or how to integrate IOT into their environment.

We've really tried to simplify, um, those workflows and make the adoption of these new technologies enabling those new use cases we talked about as frictionless as possible. I love it. Good stuff, man.

Bart, what else do anything else we haven't hit on? Uh, I think we touched on, you know, the three primary, um, yep. Uh, things that, that we've introduced in, in this release.

Obviously the new Ruckus one platform, this concept of multi-access, public and private networks all offered as a servant. Excellent, man. Bart, as always, a pleasure to have you on here.

Um, pleasure be with you, Alan. Thank you so much for your time. Come On, gonna keep us posted of what's going on with Ruckus as well as the rest of com CommScope.

Right. But we bet. All good stuff.

I'd be happy to. All right. Bar Giordano, uh, GM of Ruckus, the Ruckus division of CommScope here on Techstrong tv.

We're gonna take a break. We'll be right back.