Macaroni Grill Deploys Aerohive for Best Wi-Fi Security, Ease of Deployment and Management

Aerohive's Client Health Score Wi-Fi Network Monitoring Feature Proves Invaluable for Troubleshooting Remotely

SUNNYVALE, Calif., March 22, 2011 - Aerohive Networks, the pioneer in controller-less Wi-Fi and cloud-enabled networking, today announced that Macaroni Grill®, the leader in upscale casual Italian dining, has deployed an Aerohive WLAN solution in 184 restaurants to date plus its corporate headquarters in Dallas, TX. Macaroni Grill chose Aerohive for best Wi-Fi security, ease of deployment and management.

News Facts

  • Macaroni Grill turned to Aerohive for wireless when they were tasked with a massive effort to revamp the nationwide restaurant chain's entire IT system. Highly-mobile area directors with laptops needed to be up and running on the corporate network when visiting restaurants in their territory.
  • Macaroni Grill chose Aerohive's cooperative control WLAN architecture because it met their Wi-Fi security, cost, ease-of-deployment and management requirements.
  • Macaroni Grill is using Aerohive's Private Pre-Shared Key (Private PSK) feature, which lets guest, legacy and hard-to-manage wireless LAN clients use strong encryption and authentication, without the complexity of implementing 802.1X.
  • Macaroni Grill is using Aerohive's Client Health Score Wi-Fi network monitoring feature for remote troubleshooting. This capability provides easy "at a glance" visibility into the status or "health" of clients connected to the Wi-Fi network.
  • Aerohive met Macaroni Grill's requirements for ease-of-deployment. Aerohive's controller-less architecture and software-based management allows configuration, deployment and management to take place in the cloud, allowing APs to be up and running within minutes of being plugged in.
  • Wi-Fi is primarily used at Macaroni Grill's corporate office in conference rooms for corporate employees, guests and vendors. For security reasons, guest access is segmented from the main network with a VLAN.
  • Future uses for the Aerohive WLAN at Macaroni Grill restaurants include possibly using wireless-based training devices. They may also start offering the ability to have wireless available for banquets and could enable their team members to someday swipe credit cards at the table using wireless devices if so desired.
  • To read the full Macaroni Grill case study, please visit http://www.aerohive.com/resources/macaroni-grill.

Comments

"The way the Aerohive evaluation works, the configuration is done in the cloud," said Drew Stafford, vice president of information technology, Macaroni Grill. "We were up and running with demo gear with very little sales support in about eight hours. The evaluation showed how very easy and intuitive Aerohive is to use."

"We set up our Aerohive HiveManager Network Management System and built default templates based on the model of the equipment," says Stafford. "We were up and running in less than an hour. It was pretty much plug and play." Once that template was set up we shipped the APs directly to the restaurants. Once the devices were plugged in at the restaurants they automatically received their initial configuration including security settings. This really impressed me because it saved us a tremendous amount of time and money on pre-staging each device."

"Managing the Wi-Fi network has been simple with Aerohive," says Stafford. "Aerohive's Client Health Score monitoring feature provides a color-coded dashboard that tells us at a glance about the 'health' of clients connected to the Wi-Fi network. It saves us time and it means we don't have to have a technical person on-hand at each restaurant location. It was ingenious of Aerohive to put that color coding right there," concluded Stafford.

About Aerohive Networks
Aerohive Networks reduces the cost and complexity of today's networks with cloud-enabled, distributed Wi-Fi and routing solutions for enterprises and medium sized companies including branch offices and teleworkers. Aerohive's award-winning cooperative control Wi-Fi architecture, public or private cloud-enabled network management, routing and VPN solutions eliminate costly controllers and single points of failure. This gives its customers mission critical reliability with granular security and policy enforcement and the ability to start small and expand without limitations. Aerohive was founded in 2006 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif. The company's investors include Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Northern Light Venture Capital and New Enterprise Associates, Inc. (NEA). For more information, please visit www.aerohive.com, call us at 408-510-6100, follow us on Twitter @Aerohive, subscribe to our blog or become a fan on our Facebook page.