Once long ago, pre-COVID, hotels, motels, and other hospitality businesses occupied a moderately simple space in people’s lives—they were a place for guests to lay their heads away from home. I was a pre-COVID hotelier, myself. It was an amazing experience. Interacting with countless numbers of guests with diverse backgrounds was refreshing and invigorating. No gloves; no mask. Humans were humans. If an issue arose, I was there; in the guests’ room, helping like they were my family. And jumping into an overcrowded elevator? My only fear was that we’d trigger an overweight-fault, and I’d be responsible for the fee.
Then the pandemic changed everything and accelerated the need for digital transformation across all industries. Technology in the hospitality industry includes the need for solutions never seen before. As hoteliers transition to a “new normal” and safely re-open establishments, there are new policies to develop and consider, especially, now, when touchless engagement mandates are in place.
Frictionless Experiences
Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, has developed solutions to enable frictionless experiences. Aruba Edge Services Platform (ESP) offers a foundation, enabling hoteliers to deliver on guest expectations and leave the light on through the doorway to hospitality transformation.
Aruba ESP is the industry’s first AI-powered platform designed to unify, automate, and protect the edge. Using the foundation of Aruba ESP, hotels can enable secure and reliable Wi-Fi, as well as support a range of IoT apps that provide a luxury experience with offering guests the comforts and technologies they have (or wish to have) at home.
New Opportunities, Reduce Costs, Stay Secure (and Do not Disturb)
Aruba ESP uses three key technology attributes that enable organizations to capitalize on new opportunities faster, reduce costs and stay secure.
- Protect
- Connect
- Analyze and Act
Let’s look at how these technologies benefit the hospitality industry.
Protect: With Zero-Trust Security, guests can expect a home-like experience in their room with confidence that their devices and data are secure. Hotels are becoming very IoT-focused, creating smart digital rooms that guests and staff can personalize (mobile check-in, keyless entry, streaming services, facility automation, associate devices, customer devices, security cameras, people counters, etc.).
IoT devices must be secured, but other data such as payment data, must be secured as well. A highly secure network allows staff to address increasing threats inside the property while also supporting security for remote access, contact and/or location tracing.
Connect: A Unified Infrastructure starts with a modern network infrastructure that is intelligent, highly automated, and very adaptable. Hoteliers require wired, wireless, and WAN solutions. They need solutions for back of house and guest access that allow them to integrate IoT innovations (employee safety and point-of-sale devices, location services, guest analytics solutions, etc.) into their network infrastructure. Supported environments include corporate and home offices, hotel properties, guest rooms, public and outside spaces (conference locations, pool, etc.). They need simple visibility and management across their entire organization with one solution.
Analyze and Act: AIOps and automation can set hoteliers apart from their competitors. Today, technology enables venues to offer guests an immersive, personalized experience that can boost loyalty and increase hotel revenue. They cannot afford to lose business due to systems, tools, or applications not working. They need AI-powered insights and automation to help them assure the best guest, associate, and hotel property operation experience. What’s needed is an architecture that collects data telemetry from the infrastructure, analyzes that data and serves up insights and recommendations to improve network performance, operational efficiency and drive new business outcomes.
More Information
Mainline is an HPE/Aruba Networks Platinum partner, the highest level in the HPE partner ecosystem. We architect and deliver high value technology solutions that address a wide variety of network and security challenges from the data center to the edge. Together we provide numerous benefits to the hospitality industry, including mobile keyless entry, and real-time safety solutions for hoteliers.
For more information on Aruba Edge Services Platform and other Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Aruba networking solutions that help you keep the lights (and internet) on for your guests contact your Mainline Account Executive directly or reach us
here.
You may be interested in:
VLOG: Security to the Edge (7:35)
BLOG: Modernize Your Network with SASE Offerings from HPE Aruba