CapPort Support on ANTlabs Gateways

Improving Captive Portal Detection and Venue Published Information for better visibility

Captive portals are commonly used by public Wi-Fi networks to restrict access to the internet until the user agrees to certain terms and conditions or authenticates successfully. While captive portals are necessary for many public Wi-Fi networks, they can be frustrating for users who are unable to connect to the internet until they have completed the login process.

Frustrations can stem from captive portals not loading fast enough or freezing, and some login methods can be lengthy or complicated. Thankfully, ANTlabs gateways provide a plethora of seamless login methods, including social media login, SMS OTP, PMS integration, Hotspot 2.0, etc to suit many usage scenarios. CapPort support on ANTlabs gateways offers an elegant solution to the other aspect of the problem, while providing improved captive portal detection and venue published information.

Improved Captive Portal Detection

ANTlabs gateways support the use of DHCP option 114 to indicate the captive portal API URL during IP address assignment. This means that supported devices can immediately fetch the API content after connecting to the network, which prompts the user to log in if the network is identified as captive based on the API response. There is no need to redirect or intercept the initial web requests that would trigger security warnings in modern browsers or delay the delivery of captive portals.

In other words, CapPort support on ANTlabs gateways enables faster and more accurate reliable detection of captive portals, and greatly improve the user experience and reduce frustration.  The diagram on the left shows an example of an Android phone’s locked screen showing the visual cues to allow the user to click the captive portal URL.

 

Venue Published Information for Better Visibility

In addition to improving captive portal detection, CapPort support on ANTlabs gateways also enables venue published information. Without this feature, after a user is successfully authenticated, they are free to move to other web content and the venue will lose the opportunity to engage with the customer further.

When a CapPort message is displayed on a device using captive portal API, the user can interact with it to immediately open their internet browser and navigate to the Venue Info URL at any time. This feature is particularly useful in scenarios such as staying at a hotel, where guests may want to easily access information about services or amenities. By simply clicking on the system message, users can access venue information, including spa, restaurant hours or any promotions offer. With the addition of location-aware websites, the guest journey becomes even more intuitive and seamless.  The diagram on the right shows the user interface where a user can find the venue URL by clicking on the “Open Site” icon.

It is worth noting that more mobile devices are beginning to support CapPort feature, specifically Apple (iOS 14 and macOS Big Sur) devices and Android 11 onward. 

Conclusion

In conclusion, CapPort support on ANTlabs gateways is a powerful tool for improving captive portal detection and providing venue published information. By using DHCP option 114 to provide the captive portal API URL and including the Venue Info URL in the CapPort message, CapPort support streamlines the process of connecting to public Wi-Fi networks and provides users with easy access to important information about the venue. As a result, CapPort support can lead to increased customer satisfaction, repeat business, and revenue for businesses.

ASP 2.0 Update #3

ENHANCEMENTS/CHANGES

• Allow admin accounts (admin level > 100) to use same email address in different organizations. Currently, email is unique across all admins.

• Note: for organization super-admin (admin level = 100), email address is still unique.

• Show only relevant valid values in Admin User edit page’s authentication type dropdown, excluding authentication types not enabled for the logged-in user’s organization.

• Increase plan duration validation to allow up to 9999 days

• Automatically assign new site to its organization super-admins. Also assign all sites belonging to an organization to its organization super-admins when the organization super-admin accounts are created.

• Show cloud icon for ACG sites in left panel to differentiate gateway from ACG sites

• Update Web Filtering GUI to support 5 profiles

• Note: gateway must be patched up-to-date to enable this feature. Please check SG 5 Update Release Notes.

• Remove display of software serial numbers for on-premise and cloud gateways.

• Include Web Filtering, QoS Rules and Plan App Shaping in the Site Duplicate feature

NOTIFICATIONS

• Categorize notifications email as [ALARM], [ALERT], [OK], [INFO], [REPORT], [CODE], [PASSWORD]

• Allow admin user to configure to receive or not receive emails and their triggers

• For service provider, the Service Provider Settings page provides options to select gateway state change, site/organization license state change, and/or organization license usage monthly report is ready.

• For organization super-admin, the Site Show > Notification > Popup provides options to select gateway state change, and site license state change

• New notification option in Organization edit panel. If it is on, organization super-admin will receive email when organization license state changes. Default value is on. Organization super-admin can now choose to turn off email notifications.

SAML SSO LOGIN

• Fix SAML SSO login failing to retrieve signature from response

• Admin log to display link to SSO login XML response for both successful and failed login

FORGET PASSWORD

• Send multiple reset password links if same email address is registered in different organization.

• Entering invalid email address should redirect to a message informing user a reset password email has been sent

ASSETS > CLOUD GATEWAY

• New form to key in Public IP and Shared Secret of cloud gateway

• Display AP configuration instructions upon successful cloud gateway site creation

PLAN EDITING

• Fix plan page to default to None QoS class if existing QoS class is not found, instead of showing server error

BUILTIN PORTAL EDITING

• Fix thumbnail generation showing previously selected template, not the current one

• Prevent downstream user from clicking social login button multiple times. This fixes the issue where multiple authentication logs are logged for a single login attempt.

• For SkyTouch /CONNECT (Events webhook) to show plan selection box to downstream user on successful authentication

• Fix missing favicon.ico in gateway downstream login page

• Fix Corporate template show no border in PMS plan selection box

CUSTOM PORTAL EDITING

• Fix issue of 504 gateway timeout error showing when big portal is uploaded.

• Add validation for mandatory welcome, error and success page fields in full custom portal

• Fix issue where welcome, error and success page settings in full custom portal get lost after the file upload dialog box is opened and closed

ALL PORTALS

• New payment method: Bank of Maldives (corresponding gateway update is required; please check SG 5 Update Release Notes)

• New social login: Apple ID (corresponding gateway update is required; please check SG 5 Update Release Notes)

• Fix memory limit exceeded issue when big resource is synced down to gateway

GATEWAY COMMAND COMMUNICATIONS

• Fix portal resource download command not resuming after gateway is rebooted.

REPORT & ANALYTICS

• Fix Transaction and Authentication report paging not working on first load when all sites is selected.

ASSETS > LICENSES > GATEWAY

• Include cloud-gateway sites in the site listing. Previously, ACG sites are not shown.

• Fix wrong ‘Used’ value in Assets > License > Gateways Page

EQUIPMENT IMPORT

• Fix 500 server error during equipment import

• Use timestamp for created datetime and updated datetime to prevent date str format changed when it is opened in excel.

VLAN IMPORT

• Fix VLAN import not updating pre-existing VLANs

CONFIG BACKUP/RESTORE

• Fix S-series upgraded to v5 not being able to perform config backup

• Fix sometimes not being able to cancel backup/restore

• Show error message in GUI if backup/restore is failed in gateway

• Note: gateway must install SG 5 Update 4 for this to work.

• Fix restore icon being disabled if backup is duplicated from another site.

REPORTS & ANALYTICS > LICENSES > LICENSE SUMMARY

• Fix memory limit exceeded issue when License Usage is refreshed

• Optimize License Summary page not to call server multiple times

• Fix site selection box showing sites not assigned to the current login user

• Fix license usage download not being able to complete

GLOBAL ACCOUNT/ROAMING

• Fix Global Account license used value not counting roaming account

• Fix Global Account relogin not working.

USER PORTAL

• Fix email login not working

• Fix facebook login showing App not active

• Fix logins resulting in ever increasing size of a log file

OTHER FIXES

• Fix plan list page not to show plans if selected site is not assigned to current logged-in user

• Fix Release Notes for accurate ordering of the software updates

• Fix Profile Edit form to check old password if password is changed.

• Fix portal duplicate to show error if modules are not enabled in destination site

• Fix admin add page not to fail while saving new admin if organization image is not found

APIS

• Add new Session GET ALL API for v1

• Fix critical error in Transaction GET ALL V2 API when listing transactions for all site groups

• Fix critical error in Users GET ALL V2 API when listing transactions for all site groups

• Fix site token incorrect error in Session GET ALL API when sessions are listed by site group name

• Fix Organization Add/Edit API: Radius timeout validation not working

• Fix Organization Edit API: internal server error on updating organization with SAML authentication

ASP VERSION: 2.0.3
RELEASE DATE: 12 Jan 2023

ASP 2.0 Update #2

This update adds the following enhancements:

   • Support for SAML IdP-initiated single sign-on to ASP admin panel for all admins including organization admins
   • New Organization Code to facilitate operational non-ambiguous reference to a specific organization
       ◦ Generate organization codes for existing organizations
       ◦ New Organization Code Prefix in Service Provider to prepend to newly created organization’s organization code
       ◦ Note: these organization codes are useful in uniquely identifying the organization when an organization is requesting its service provider for updates to its allotted licenses.
   • Bandwidth enhancement for on-premise gateways:
       ◦ Allow ASP admin to configure device bandwidth sharing method:
           ▪ By account (the default), allowing multiple devices of the same user to share a single bandwidth rate-limit
           ▪ By device, applying the plan’s rate limit on each device
           ▪ Important note: if your gateway is using the by-device option before this update, you will need to manually set it to such from the ASP admin panel after this update.
           ▪ Note: gateway requires software update to apply this setting that is pushed down from ASP. Please check gateway’s respective release notes.
   • Custom portal enhancement:
       ◦ Remove MIME type and file extension filter from file selector prompt to allow upload of any file type
   • Organization admin enhancement:
       ◦ Allow to change email address of existing organization admin
     • API enhancements:
       ◦ Get One Global Code/Account
           ▪ Show more info for last logged in site
       ◦ Organization Add API
           ▪ Support new authentication type: SAML SSO
           ▪ Generate organization code
       ◦ Organization Edit API
           ▪ Support new authentication type: SAML SSO
       ◦ Get One/All Organization(s)
           ▪ Show organization code and SAML settings in output

This update includes the following fixes:
   • Duplicate Site Settings
       ◦ Fix site duplicate status showing 100% and never transiting to Success and settings not syncing down to gateway
   • Dashboard
       ◦ Fix 403 Forbidden error in the shortcut panel when logged-in admin has no admin edit role
   • API
       ◦ Fix Get All Sessions issue where filtering by inactive sessions shows all records
       ◦ Fix Get One Global Account showing Code Not Found error for first API call

ASP VERSION: 2.0.2
RELEASE DATE: 26 Sep 2022

How to deploy ANTlabs Advanced QoS/QoS+ and dramatically improve your Wi-Fi network

Are users complaining about slow WiFi speeds? Do you want to provide your guests, or staff with all the bandwidth they need?

Are you struggling to meet bandwidth requirements for guest WiFi, and cringing at the prospect of asking Management for yet another budget request to buy more internet connections?  Wished you read this article before the last budget request?

Have you been asked to implement QoS on your network but don’t know where to start? This blog post will explain how Advanced QoS can help you with all the above. Let’s get started!

Basic QoS 101

Quality of Service (QoS) can help you by providing better control and management of your traffic. QoS can improve your user experience by giving certain types of traffic priority over others. This can be especially useful if you have time-sensitive applications or need to manage large amounts of traffic.

Without QoS, your network would be a free-for-all where every application competes for bandwidth equally. That might work fine for small networks, but as soon as you start adding more users and applications, things can get bogged down quickly.  With QoS, you can give priority to the traffic that matters most to your business. For example, you can prioritize voice traffic over email or video streaming. Alternatively, you may decide that social media usage like YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter is banned in your network.

However, not all QoS features are built equal. You need to understand that simple QoS solutions don’t help much, if at all. For example, simple rate-limit, or device-level QoS control targets individual devices. It has no idea what applications are being used, who the user is, or how many devices within the same room are hogging all the bandwidth. A small group of users can monopolize the network. Implementing QoS can be complex, but the benefits are worth it.

What is Advanced QoS / QoS+ and how does it work?

Save money and time, while improving the end-user experience: Advanced QOS (AQoS) and Advanced QoS Plus (AQoS+) module from ANTlabs control who gets priority, where, and when. No need to buy expensive network equipment, and spend days installing and troubleshooting, as both are software modules add-on to our ANTlabs gateways.  It is easy to deploy and optimizes throughput over a network with a multi-stage QoS engine and customizable application shaping. It enables you to grant VIP users more bandwidth, speeds up those applications that need them (e.g., VoIP or IPTV), and it provides comprehensive control over the quality of your network.  The IT administrator just needs to define the locations, and QoS plans that is to be applied to different user groups, and simply configure on a graphical web-based interface on our managed Cloud Wi-Fi platform (ASP/Cloud ASP).

ANTlabs Advanced QoS / QoS+ is a powerhouse

With more than 20 years of R&D and industry experience for visitor-based networking in hospitality and large venues, ANTlabs has purpose-built the QoS engine to optimize hospitality Wi-Fi, and offer world-class airports and sports venues superior guest Wi-Fi solutions.

One of the unique features of the ANTlabs Advanced QoS 3-stage engine is its capability to allow multiple devices to share a single bandwidth rate limit per user. For example, you wish to allocate 10MB per guest or staff. Each user will only use up this amount of bandwidth among all his/her active devices, and it will be shared equally amongst them.

With the Advanced QoS 3-stage engine, bandwidth utilization can be maximized by creating differentiated classes of services for different groups of users.

All user traffic goes through the Advanced QoS 3-stage engine:

Stage 1.  As we mentioned earlier, the first stage engine is unique to ANTlabs, and applies bandwidth rate limit to the individual user instead of device-level. Together with authentication, this innovation allows different users to be treated according to their VIP status or needs, instead of blindly applying one simple limit to a device.

Stage 2.  This second stage engine defines different QoS Tiers (Guaranteed Tier, Premium Tier and Basic Tier) where different user groups can be assigned to the desired tier. Between the tiers, higher or lower priorities are given as to who gets the bandwidth, and the IT Manager can specify the total maximum bandwidth allocated to a tier for better control.  In this way, no single group of users can monopolize the whole network and the IT Dept has better visibility and control.  Furthermore, the surplus bandwidth from any bandwidth tier, can be temporarily re-allocated to another congested bandwidth tier automatically, optimizing network resources.

Stage 3.  In the third stage, global application traffic shaping can be applied to network ports used by applications. This allows the bandwidth used by specific types of applications (of all users) to be controlled further.  In this way, more control can be applied so that no application will be starved for network resources.  Certain applications’ bandwidth consumption can be suppressed or given more priority to use up the network bandwidth.

Advanced QoS Plus (QoS+) is the latest innovation leap by ANTlabs.  It has all the features of the original Advanced QoS module and more! As some applications like BitTorrent evolve to evade port-based application blocking, Advanced QoS+ classifies the applications more accurately based on website categorization without relying on which network ports are being used.  This signature-based website categorization is regularly updated to improve accuracy.  Another improvement is more fine-grained control for the global application shaping.  By allowing you to define QoS policies for different user groups, you can optimize the network further with better accuracy.

For example, you can create a special user group to give priority to streaming services.   When you apply this to paying customers or VVIP customers, they will be able to enjoy better quality streaming in their rooms or anywhere in the network.   You can also make your network more family-friendly and safer by blocking adult-related, gambling sites or known blacklisted sites.

How does Advanced QoS /QoS+ help improve the user experience?

As far as the users are concerned, they will find that applications will now run better on their devices with Advanced QoS enabled. They may not even notice any slowdown or pausing in their applications, and simply assume more internet connections were added. If you are a VIP user, you will be pleased that even in public areas, you enjoy a faster and better quality of bandwidth compared to guest users. For the management, you can be assured that the existing network resources are well-optimized, and buying more Internet bandwidth can be delayed or dispensed with.  In some cases, you may even scale down the number of internet connections, and save costs since network usage has become more efficient.

Conclusion

In conclusion, by deploying ANTlabs’ Advanced QoS / QoS+, you can greatly improve your network performance and ensure that critical applications always have the bandwidth they need. You don’t need a lot of network expertise or expensive hardware to implement.  By carefully planning your QoS strategy and implementing it correctly, you can take your network to the next level and please everyone (including the bosses!), leaving you more time to handle other pressing matters.

Make sure to include ANTlabs’ Advanced QoS or Advanced QoS Plus module in your next budget request so that you don’t need to go back to ask for more in future!

 

ASP 2.0 Update #1

This update adds the following enhancements:

• • Enhanced display of HA information
  • ◦ Assets -> Gateways page to show the gateway’s HA master/slave state
  • ◦ Site details page to show ID2 info where applicable
  • ◦ Site listing page to show hardware and software serial numbers for both ID1 and ID2 where applicable
• • Location portal enhancements
  • ◦ When PMS type is Micros PMS, hide irrelevant options (room-based authentication and VIP plan configuration)
• • API enhancements
  • ◦ New APIs
    • ▪ Get all sessions
    • ▪ Get all APs
    • ▪ Get details of an AP
    • ▪ Add AP
    • ▪ Update AP
    • ▪ Delete AP
  • ◦ Updated APIs
    • ▪ Get details of a global code or account to show at which site the user is currently logged in with this code/account
• • Add Mikrotik RouterBOARD and Ubiquiti Unifi options to AP editor
• • Profile management enhancement
  • ◦ Show reminder message that password is managed by an external server if RADIUS-authenticated admin login has been enabled for an organization and its organization admin attempts to change password

This update includes the following fixes:

• • Report fixes:
  • ◦ Wrong authentication count in Authentication report
  • ◦ AP usage history report showing empty chart when filtered by All APs
  • ◦ Session report showing ‘Selected date range should not be more than one month’ when last 30 days is selected.
• • AP license synchronization fixes:
  • ◦ Site-AP relationship breaks during license synchronization
  • ◦ AP deletion fails if AP is not found in licensor
• • Organization super-admin-related fixes:
  • ◦ Assets > Gateways search showing empty result
  • ◦ Site notification email not sending to organization super-admin
  • ◦ Organization logo image cropper pop-up not showing Use button
  • ◦ Cannot save new admin if site selection is empty

ASP VERSION: 2.0.1
RELEASE DATE: 3 Jun 2022

ASP 2.0 Release

This major version release adds the following enhancements:

• • Enhanced licensing
  • ◦ New types of licenses for on-premise gateways:
    • ▪ Gateway connectors
    • ▪ Web-filtering licenses
    • ▪ Global accounts
    • ▪ Config backups
  • ◦ Consolidated Wi-Fi license management for both on-premise and cloud gateways
  • ◦ Allow organization super-admins to claim gateways by hardware serial numbers
  • ◦ Allow service provider to assign service start/expiry, licenses, gateways and modules to each organization
• • Support for new version 5.0.0 gateways
• • Location portal enhancements
  • ◦ Upgrade built-in templates to support plan upgrade prompt for PMS-authenticated guests
• • Enhanced look and feel for Home and Overview pages

This update includes the following bug fix:

• • Show list of saved configurations even for site with no assigned gateway

ASP VERSION: 2.0
RELEASE DATE: 3 Jun 2022

Wi-Fi for MDUs requires a unique service management feature set

ANTlabs is featured on Wi-Fi NOW regarding the Wi-Fi managed services platform, ASP / ASP Cloud, as well as a host of gateway features and services like Advanced QoS, Personal Area Network (PAN), and Web Filtering to enhance the user experience for MDUs (Multi-Dwelling Units).

Introduction

The demand for managed Wi-Fi services for MDUs is on the rise worldwide, but standard enterprise-grade Wi-Fi services are rarely the right solutions for residential premises. The answer is a dedicated Wi-Fi feature set that affords residents all the benefits of professional MDU Wi-Fi including security, dynamic quality of service (QoS) management, and personal area networks.

MDUs are characterised by a lot of building tenants often living relatively close together. The need for dynamic quality of service management is important – as is delivering the right security. Add to this that tenants also want to be able to share content over the private Wi-Fi networks inside their unit only. Standard enterprise-grade Wi-Fi management – even in the Cloud – is simply not enough.  MSPs (Managed Service Providers) offering managed Wi-Fi service in an MDU environment will benefit greatly from ANTlabs solutions that improve productivity, and boost user satisfaction and operational efficiency.

Read more about it below…

Wi-Fi for MDUs requires a unique service management feature set, says ANTlabs

ASP Update #11

This update adds the following enhancements:

• – Location portal enhancements:
  • > New option in PMS authentication method to hide View Messages and Retrieve Bill buttons in success page
  • > Facebook Like / Share on success page for all social networks
• – New config backup duplicate feature to copy a config backup from one site to another site
  • > Note: As network configurations will be copied from one site to another, it is recommended that the config backup be taken at the state where WAN uses DHCP-acquired gateway so as to avoid losing WAN connectivity after restoring the config at the site the config is copied to.

This update fixes the following issues:

• – Location portal:
  • > Facebook Like / Share config controls are hidden in portal edit page although Facebook authentication has been enabled
  • > After successful PMS authentication:
    • – Retrieving bill returns ‘Transaction error: previous request is still being processed’
    • – Viewing messages returns “No messages found” although XL messages have been received from PMS
  • > Reports:
    • – Missing date in downloaded revenue report
    • – Authentication report download results in HTTP status code 500 when user login session has expired
    • – Usage report shows 0 New Users
  • > Accessing gateway GUI via ASP results in SSL certificate warning
  • > Session accounting log maintenance fix

ASP VERSION: 1.0.11
RELEASE DATE: 24 MAR 2022

Automation: The Next Big Thing for Cloud and Digitization

A for Automation

According to Wikipedia, automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes. As the tongue-in-cheek section header implies, automation may very soon be the first thing on your priority to-do list.  Much has been said about the merits of moving to the “Cloud” or “Digitization”.  While shifting to the cloud or making business processes more digital will have some inherent productivity gains or even strategic advantages, we feel that automation is key to driving more impactful revenue and operational results.

Automation is critical to providing a consistent and satisfying customer experience, benefiting from expert decision-making, or ensuring a high level of service quality.  These are attributes that are especially important for the service industry, including for Network Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Telcos, and the Hospitality industry.

Benefits of Automation for the MSPs, Telcos and Hospitality Industry

1.  As business activities pick up, MSPs that can scale up and down quickly and cost-effectively will be able to benefit from this trend. Venue owners and businesses who are facing uncertainty will prefer low start-up cost and pay-as-you-use subscription business models. MSPs who can provide flexibility to customers and tune their pricing models quickly will dominate the market. “Wi-Fi-as-a-service” (WiFi-aaS) is fast gaining popularity and increasingly preferred.

2.  The demand for Enterprise managed Wi-Fi services should pick up as business owners and corporates want to outsource infrastructure investment or migrate from Capex to Opex spending model, while relying on MSPs to deliver reliable wireless connectivity for their operations. Centralized monitoring, with easy remote onboarding of customers while empowering them to self-help or administer basic functions are critical success factors.

3.  It is important for MSPs to have deep understanding of their target customer segments and what is happening in their network, in order to spot business opportunities or respond quickly to operational issues respectively. In the past, many MSPs have built systems in silos to address different business opportunities which made data consolidation and analytics difficult or impossible. A good centralized system that incorporates data analytics with machine learning can help both Marketing, Business Development and Operations team to better address market segments and ensure service levels are met.

ANTlabs ASP / ASP Cloud Managed Wi-Fi Solutions for MSPs

There are many ways that automation can be applied to allow companies to reap the benefits mentioned earlier. Here are some examples that ANTlabs has helped evolve our customer’s business processes with our product features or our ability to help customize to their requirements.

Backup and recovery automation for optimum system availability and resiliency

With our ASP managed service platform or ASP Cloud service, configuration and recovery data can be backed up centrally. During system failures at a local site, high availability on our gateways automatically kicks in, preventing service downtime. Alerts are sent out automatically. In the event of a full local system failure, the MSP can quickly send in a replacement unit and restore the service fast with the backups that are stored in the cloud. With simple instructions, a non-IT staff can power up a gateway and allow both the gateway and ASP to automatically self-configure and restore optimized settings finetuned by IT group corporate. All these can be monitored remotely by an administrator(s) from our ASP platform.

Dynamic login pages automation for best user experience and lower operation workload

The IT Administrator of a MICE venue can predefine and configure new login portal pages to be shown at a specific location at a specific date and time so that they don’t have to remember to change or rush to make last-minute changes before a new event starts. Our Event Manager module helps save time, while potentially allowing non-IT staff to help in times of manpower crunch with the easy-to-use, and intuitive user interface.

Automated surveys for more customer satisfaction insights

A customer satisfaction survey can be sent automatically after a guest has checked out of a hotel or finished a meal at a restaurant. Instead of relying on staff to remember to do this mundane step and collate the results, such a simple form of automation can alert management if service standards have been exemplary or degraded.

Improve Telcos and MSPs productivity and mitigate manpower resources crunch

During government-mandated lockdowns, ANTlabs Tru’AUTH AAA and Tru’IP DHCP/DNS systems have aided Telcos and MSPs to respond rapidly to shifting consumption spikes of bandwidth in the network. AAA authentication, DHCP, and DNS service are important network services for a Telco. With automation, a much leaner network team could bring up new network coverage quickly and shift the required network resources to multiple sites without sacrificing quality. Coupled with the use of telemetry data, automated expert rules can help Operations teams during maintenance windows to ensure that pre-established operational procedures set up by experienced operators can be faithfully executed by less experienced staff. Real-time visibility on our systems, help provide human engineers or managers with speedy confirmation of service recovery and relevant reports for audit.

The above examples illustrate the wide range that automation can enhance service quality in small steps for individual customers or create a huge impact on an operator’s network affecting millions.

Conclusion

Automation is the next step to realize the benefits of shifting to the cloud and digitization of business processes. For more than 20 years, ANTlabs has built robust networking solutions for Telcos, MSPs, large venues, and the hospitality industry. With our unique insight into the needs of small venue owners to large-scale network operators, we continually apply automation through product innovation and customize for our customers. The ability to customize to our customers’ environment is one of many unique advantages offered by ANTlabs.

Automation is key to driving more impactful revenue and operational results. It will allow the MSPs, Telcos, and hospitality industry to provide a consistently high-quality customer experience, respond faster to a dynamic business environment and ensure a high level of operational efficiency.

 

 

 

How Managed Wi-Fi Service Providers can prosper in 2022

A new year of challenges and opportunities

As the new Lunar Year of the Tiger is upon us, we are hopeful that 2022 will be a year of opportunities for managed service providers (MSPs) providing Managed Wi-Fi services. For the past 2 years, there have been unpredictable drops in customer demand and business activity, as well as sudden surges after lull periods. Shortage of labour and supply chain disruptions have also created unforeseen issues which require innovative solutions and change in mindset and paradigms to ride through the challenges. Technology and innovation are often cited as catalysts to help businesses transform to overcome these disruptions and emerge more agile and competitive. So how can MSPs position themselves to win in 2022?

Here are 5 ways that we believe MSPs can take advantage of the business opportunities:

1. As business activities pick up, MSPs that can scale up and down quickly and cost-effectively will be able to benefit from this trend. Venue owners and businesses who are facing uncertainty will prefer low start-up cost and pay-as-you-use subscription business models. MSPs who can provide flexibility to customers and tune their pricing models quickly will dominate the market. “Wi-Fi-as-a-service” (WiFi-aaS) is fast gaining popularity and increasingly preferred.

2. The demand for Enterprise managed Wi-Fi services should pick up as business owners and corporates want to outsource infrastructure investment or migrate from Capex to Opex spending model, while relying on MSPs to deliver reliable wireless connectivity for their operations. Centralized monitoring, with easy remote onboarding of customers while empowering them to self-help or administer basic functions are critical success factors.

3. It is important for MSPs to have deep understanding of their target customer segments and what is happening in their network, in order to spot business opportunities or respond quickly to operational issues respectively. In the past, many MSPs have built systems in silos to address different business opportunities which made data consolidation and analytics difficult or impossible. A good centralized system that incorporates data analytics with machine learning can help both Marketing, Business Development and Operations team to better address market segments and ensure service levels are met.

ANTlabs ASP / ASP Cloud Managed Wi-Fi Solutions for MSPs

With more than 2 decades of experience working with Telcos, service providers and hospitality players, ANTlabs has developed a centralized managed service platform called ASP (ANTlabs Service Platform) that can help MSPs address the opportunities outlined here. For customers with small number of sites, ANTlabs also provides ASP Cloud – a pay-as-you-use subscription service based on the same ASP platform to help them get started and realize the benefits that would otherwise be inaccessible to them.

4. While wireless connectivity is indispensable, it is also fast becoming a commodity. Yet delivering good quality high-speed internet access (HSIA) service can make or break the success of WiFi-aaS for MSPs. Consistently high quality of service (QoS) requires end to end effort: from the edge devices providing differentiated network QoS control for different user groups, to controlling what kinds of application traffic has priority so that overall user experience is enhanced.

Beyond HSIA: User-aware, location aware services

Besides HSIA as a service, MSPs should allow other network services to easily launched and subscribed by end customers. ANTlabs ASP platform has the unique ability to allow MSPs to launch user-aware, location-aware services that are customizable to fit different customer segments. Take for example, a web filtering service to protect network users from malware or undesirable content. MSPs can provide a different customer profile with a corresponding set of filtering criteria for corporate use, versus, hospitality customers.

5. Finally, with the trend to move business processes online and the shift towards Cloud operations, MSPs should leverage on the same WiFi-aaS platform to capture customers in other business verticals. ANTlabs ASP platform has multi-tenancy features that allow different end user organizations to subscribe and manage their own network, and flexible features that allow the MSPs to address different verticals like corporate, hospitality, retail, finance and even education. With small increment cost, MSPs can leverage on the ANTlabs ASP platform to expand their existing business by providing Managed WiFi business to new business verticals.

Conclusion

ANTlabs has built the ASP platform to be a robust centralized managed service platform for MSPs to realize a scalable, and cost-effective Managed WiFi Service model with the added benefit of launching new services quickly, and allowing them to expand beyond their traditional hospitality or corporate customer base. As WiFi-as-as-service (WiFi-aaS) becomes the norm with more businesses going online in 2022 and beyond, MSPs who can capitalize on these trends will have first-mover advantage and build a sustainable and profitable business.