Is Your Hotel Network Infrastructure Fit to Embrace Your Mobile Strategy?
By Tony Heung
Whether it's guest facing or hotel internal operations, mobile strategy is happening amongst all the major brands and quite rightly so. Whether it's mobile booking, mobile check-in and mobile key access, or check in via a tablet and reporting room clean status via tablet and mobile PoS device, surround mobile becomes key to the hotel industry. It is predominantly the “during” experience that becomes the key differentiator between brands. In order to facilitate an excellent stay experience, the key foundation is a purpose-built and consistent wireless/wired network that allows all different applications to effectively and securely operate on a single converged network. Guests are also expecting a home-from-home experience or even a better-than-home experience, which can be a huge technological challenge for the hotelier to fulfill. TripAdvisor and other review websites become the key differentiating factor for the guest to select which hotel to spend money on after the first criteria of location and second criteria of cost. The quality of Wi-Fi becomes the third most important criteria. Having a true digital experience requires true digital excellence, which can be fulfilled by a fully converged network in a cost efficient model. The majority of hotels have multiple networks, whether it's just for the guest Wi-Fi or a separate network for processing credit card payments, and one for access to the reservation system and PMS. This type of separated network means higher overall cost, less efficiency and more importantly, there is no application-level integration possible due to the lack of inter-connect between each system. The first key to success is to define the brand standard on the converged network. However, more importantly, the second key is how to enforce and induce the hoteliers to follow and implement the brand network standard. **What is a Fully Converged Network?** A fully converged network is a single infrastructure across both wired and wireless domains to provide network connectivity to any applications. Depending on whether the hotel is a new build or going through major/minor refurbishment, there are six major areas, which would apply to the principle of a fully converged network. **Design and Build** This phase sounds obvious, as it makes no difference from designing and building the hotel room from scratch; from the floor plan, to a sample room and “copy and paste” to the rest of the hotel. In the networking context, the first step is to understand the requirement such as which brand and brand standard would apply to the hotel, which third party vendors would require network connectivity and in what form. This phase of vital requirement collection is to be fully and clearly documented so as to remove as many moving parts as possible, as this also helps to lock down the scope and cost estimate of the fully converged network. The design should be broken down into multiple stages, to allow input from all the key stakeholders and agreement on the phase deliverables. For the building phase, like the hotel sample room, it is critical to map out and create a small test lab either offsite or on-property, so each third party vendor can map the lab for testing the application compatibility, speed up the installation and avoid surprises with the big bang approach. The advantages of on-property is that there are certain elements that would not be possible or practical to do offsite, such as the leased line/MPLS router to access the cloud/centralized PMS or integration with IPTV source (e.g. satellite link), which requires planning permission to install the satellite dish on the roof. The on-property option not only helps to reduce the overall cost of design and build but also allows hotel training to be scheduled as soon as new staff start using the lab setup to learn the systems. **Install and Configure** This phase should be fairly straightforward if the High Level Design (HLD) is completed in the first phase of Design and Build. This again should be a “copy and paste” job, such as replicating the number of access switches to each floor cabinet, or deploying wireless access points across the property. For the install phase, documentation will be one of the most important deliverables, as it will form the basis of any ongoing service and maintenance, as well as the backing of the SLA and contractual terms you will be getting from the provider. Some countries have strict rules covering but not limited to the fire regulations, building standard and health and safety regulations. The written language would also need to be considered as while most will use English on the main document, some countries would enforce the as-built document to be in the local legal language for contractual reasons. For the configuration phase, it would convert the HLD to the LLD (Low-Level Design) which would not only confirm all the functional requirements but also all the security aspects, allowing the fully converged network to be PCI-DSS compliant. The configuration should be packaged up based on the earlier phase from the lab testing result. As soon as the configuration is signed off by all parties, it should be packaged up for future version control and for applying the strict change control process to ensure the integrity of the configuration as well as the security compliance. The security document should also include the original HLD security requirement, with the converted configuration to be applied at the firewall, access control on the switches and wireless controller. It should also follow a systematic penetration testing (pen-testing) and the result should be fully documented within a password-protected document. The ongoing security check should be applied using MARRK1 and/or PCI-DSS SAQ mechanism. **System Integration** This phase is the key differentiator between the traditional ISP or the Telco vs. the System Integrator (SI), as it is understandable that the revenue stream coming from the hotel is a small portion to the overall revenue that Telco would be getting from the much larger consumer market or other verticals. Usually the attention to the hotel's needs and requirements will be of far less interest from the Telco. On the other hand, SI revenue stream would be mostly coming from the hotel market causing them to have huge interest in creating an ecosystem, which would provide a fully converged network to support the hotel operations in a cost effective manner. With all the different applications that the hotel is dependent on to run the business, SI will develop the joint-up environment that a single network would be designed and setup to allow many other hotel applications to run on the same infrastructure. This system/application integration phase allows the hotel IT team to liaise with the SI plan ahead of the applications being deployed and if there are other changes since the first phase of Design and Build. **Third Party Vendor Management** Naming only a few, some of the applications that the hotel would be deploying on the network would be PMS, BMS, GMS, CRM, CRS, EMS, PoS, IP-CCTV, Key-card, Minibar, IPTV, HSIA, ISP, VoIP, In-Room Control, Digital Signage, etc. By no means is this a complete list of all the possible applications that the hotel IT director would have to liaise with but more importantly rather than having 15 separate networks, now having a single fully converged network would mean SI helps take away the burden, leaving SI to manage and liaise with all these third parties vendors to operate flawlessly on the same network. Each application mentioned above would have their own requirements regarding: - bandwidth (e.g. UHD/4K IPTV would require over 20Mbps), - network latency (e.g. VoIP requires real-time traffic prioritisation), - security profile (e.g. PoS taking credit card payment would need to be secured/segmented via a firewall to satisfy one of the PCI-DSS compliance requirements), - connectivity coverage (e.g. IP-CCTV must be a wired connection for security and anti-tamper reasons) - inter-application interface (e.g. BMS/EMS communicates securely via VLAN to PMS to get guest profiles for check-in/out to turn on AC) For this phase, the LLD would be revised accordingly and the as-built document would also form the basis to allow SI to take over the service management as Single Point of Contact (SPoC). This means the hotel IT team only needs to liaise with SI rather than getting involved when something does not work and it ending in a finger-pointing game, leaving the hotel IT manager to be blamed by the GM or the hotel owner. **Network Management and Monitoring** This phase defines as soon as the hotel is operational and serving guests. In order to ensure the network integrity (as the fully converged network is the key foundation of the hotel business operation), a structured network management and monitoring provides a sufficient, proactive approach and ensures that every single application does what it is supposed to do. More importantly it is to catch anything not supposed to happen, such as unauthorized cowboy changes to the configuration, which should also be caught in the management and monitoring tool automatically. Another aspect is definition of network traps and warnings, as if the system is overwhelmed by millions of traps every minute it would simply confuse the support staff, and end up turning off the alarms as false-positive, or allow the critical alarms to be ignored. There is a good example of this from one of the largest retail groups in the US failing this and it ended up losing millions of customer personal records and their associated credit card details. **Performance and Reporting** This phase forms part of the Service Level Agreement (SLA). Sometimes the hotel will just get the SLA for the sake of comfort, or sometimes as leverage to terminate a contract. However, SLA plays a key role in the network integrity and knowing the network is performing as it is designed to perform. The escalation matrix should be defined at the contractual phase, ensuring the right level of personnel within the SI and the hotel are informed of any issues. The performance reporting can also show the network usage trend and help the hotel IT director or financial director to define next year's budget for any required network growth, and more importantly the growth is backed up by the black and white reporting showing the trend or bottleneck. This provides a solid baseline to spend budget on growing network capability rather than an educated guess. Some may say that some of the above phases apply to the case of single network anyway. It is true, however if the hotel is having to do the management, monitoring, performance and reporting 15 times on 15 separate networks, it would not be feasible unless the hotel has a huge IT team with the skilled personnel to do so. **Why is it Important?** To improve the “During” experience, a number of hotel groups should be working with many different initiatives to add better experience for the guest. All these initiatives will be mobile-related and almost every guest will carry at least one mobile device. In order to test the incumbent concept, the marketing team would not have to worry about the hotel Wi-Fi providing sufficient coverage, or if the application deployed can communicate with other applications already existing on the network. The fully converged network will fulfill all of these, as the network is already in a flexible mode to allow this to happen. For the same mobile initiative to deploy globally, having the same brand standard on the fully converged network means the initiative can be rolled out with consistency and no surprises or unexpected capex/opex cost to enable the initiative. For example, to deploy mobile key cards, it would require the key lock to be in online mode to allow the NFC/BLE module to connect to the on-property or cloud key server for authentication with the mobile app. Without the pre-configured, customized Wi-Fi network and the correct security setting (802.1x with mac-auth), it would take a long time to bring all the key locks online. Another example is the cleaner mobile app linked to housekeeping manager. It will track all the cleaners using Wi-Fi enabled wearable technology, in terms of efficiently allocating resources, mapping the guest check-out timing, and quicker turnaround to make the room available for the next guest. To do this, the mobile app (using the cleaner's own smartphone) or wearable technology would require Wi-Fi to provide the location information using the RTLS/LBS platform. The fully converged network also has the backend connectivity to the cloud analytic platform, processing the raw data and allowing the housekeeping manager to access the analytic portal securely via their tablet, with access over the whole property. The inter-network connectivity also allows the PMS checkout record to be sent to the analytic platform to prioritize the cleaner's movement and recommend the optimized route. Finally, hotel brands need to add extra value to the loyalty member program as the life-time value of the loyalty member contributes far more than the non-member. One incentive is to provide free Wi-Fi for the top-tier members when they are booking through the hotel's own website. This could drive more direct bookings and avoid paying the commission to the OTA, which can be used to offset the revenue lost from giving away Wi-Fi for free. Without an efficient way to utilize the fully converged network, it would add administrative overhead to the front desk staff to take the Wi-Fi charge item from the bill. With the fully converged network, the Wi-Fi connectivity can determine if the guest has the correct top-tier profile in their hotel mobile app and use it as authentication with Hotspot 2.0 technology to provide secure and seamless Wi-Fi connectivity, without the guest needing to do anything. This is gradually becoming available as Hotspot 2.0 is still in trial phases. Alternatively with today's technology, the HSIA landing page when the guest connects to the Wi-Fi can present a page that allows the guest to input their information and interact with the PMS or CRM; providing a great “During” experience by providing free Wi-Fi. **How to Achieve Success** After considering all the above definition of fully converged network as well as the tangible benefits, the hotel brands would already have defined the brand standard on converged network and all the relevant documentation would be made available to the hotel owner. As usual without any buy-in from the hotel owner who will be paying the converged network from his/her own pocket, it is important to demonstrate the financial benefit of doing so. One option is to demonstrate the cost savings. For example, the hotel owner may be paying five separate networks with five separate Internet lines. By simply consolidating five Internet lines into two good quality redundant lines, not only giving the hotel owner much more bandwidth with the same or lower cost but also the reliability from the dual redundant links for all third party vendors to use for management purposes. For those on the franchise agreement, one option would be to apply a penalty to the hotel owner who fails to apply the brand standard on fully converged network. This can be achieved by either applying an extra charge for the reservation fee via CRS or reducing the rebate via the loyalty program. Alternatively it can be added to the franchise agreement as mandatory and non-negotiable to deploy the brand standard on fully converged network. With this risk and reward approach, the hotel owner is given an incentive to adopt the fully converged network brand standard, while seeing the operational and cost efficiency immediately. Whenever possible, the brand should also promote the fully converged network as a solution or product that can be sold to the hotel owner and management group. This allows them to easily digest what, why, how and how-much and make the decision much quicker.
