EDITOR’S QUESTION
HOW IMPORTANT
IS WI-FI AND
CONNECTIVITY IN THE
WORKPLACE?
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R
uckus Networks, an ARRIS company,
and World Wide Worx, has released
the results of a new study, Wi-Fi in
South Africa, which highlights the usage,
priorities, intentions and attitudes regarding
Wi-Fi technology and its deployment in
Smart Cities.
“The research reveals the growing
importance of Wi-Fi for both business use
and local Smart City project roll-outs,” said
Arthur Goldstuck, Managing Director at
World Wide Worx.
“While the need for Wi-Fi is growing, there
are still a few hurdles that South Africa
need to overcome if we are to truly reap the
benefits of pervasive connectivity.”
Wi-Fi is critical in corporations
The research shows that 97% of
corporations and 95% of small businesses
use Wi-Fi internally, with over half stating
the need for Wi-Fi access everywhere as
very important. This statistic indicates that
Wi-Fi has become critical to employee
activity and further demonstrates the
trends for small businesses are in line with
larger enterprises.
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INTELLIGENTCIO
However, despite the enthusiasm for
pervasive Wi-Fi, large businesses in
South Africa limit out-of-office use, solely
depending on in-house use.
• Half of the respondents said their entire
staff are using Wi-Fi internally, with the
rest reporting a sliding scale
• External use, on the other hand, flipped
this trend around, with 59% saying
they did not allow external use of Wi-Fi
to access the corporate network, with
a sliding scale declining to 13% saying
they allowed all staff to access the
network from external Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi quality is more important than cost
It is a common misconception that, when
making a purchasing decision, businesses
consider the low cost of a provider’s service
above all else. This study shows that this is
untrue for Wi-Fi services. The four findings for
cost, quality, speed and constant connectivity
for Wi-Fi are:
• 94% of respondents ranked quality of
Wi-Fi connection to be the most important
factor, followed by speed and constant
connectivity ranked both at 92%
• Cost ranked last out of the four options
at 81%
• 93% of respondents said all four
factors, quality of connection, speed,
constant connectivity and cost were
equally important
Findings for uses of Wi-Fi indicated
the following:
• 86% of large businesses predominantly
use Wi-Fi for IoT security and monitoring,
80% for connection to the intranet and
70% for cloud integration and adoption
• Small businesses use Wi-Fi predominantly
for connection to the Internet and Intranet
(95%), followed by cloud adoption and
IoT integration
“This research indicates that a strong reliable
Wi-Fi network is critical for South African
businesses and Smart City deployments,”
said Riaan Graham, Sales Director for Ruckus
Networks, sub-Saharan Africa.
“Although there are still several hurdles
to overcome, it is reassuring to see a
widespread belief that Smart Cities can
provide value to the economy and citizens,
with Wi-Fi as the ‘glue’.”
www.intelligentcio.com