International. As the world becomes more digital and the Internet of Things continues to grow exponentially, enterprise networks have become more connected than ever. However, this implies other important challenges to maintain a reliable network, such as the protection of confidential data, maintaining stable connections, correct support for the variety of management systems connected to the network, maintaining the availability of the network, among others. Given this panorama, the big question is how to achieve a more reliable network for the business?
"The enterprise network is rarely news when it works well, but when there is, for example, an unplanned network outage, this can impact the entire company in many ways," said Andrés Mariño, Senior Field Application Engineer at CommScope. "A network crash is among the worst things that can happen to a company, not only because of the impact it can have economically, but also on productivity and, of course, on the company's reputation with its customers."
A robust, resilient and intelligent network infrastructure goes a long way toward minimizing failures, as well as maximizing network availability and reliability. Although to a large extent the success of this depends on the design and administration of the network, for Ingeniero Mariño there are three areas to consider:
Converged infrastructure support
Convergence is a trend that has become very relevant in recent years and has become increasingly important in the enterprise LAN network. In this context, both fiber and Category 6A cabling have become critical, thanks to the fact that in addition to simplifying the physical network, they allow administrators to provide greater bandwidth for emerging technologies and carry higher speeds, improving network reliability and business continuity.
Infrastructure Intelligence
A key strategy for maximizing reliability and availability is intelligent network management. Currently, there are automated management systems that allow continuous and remote monitoring of the connectivity of the entire physical layer of the network. "AIM automated management systems, such as imVision, can also help document all changes and even alert staff to unscheduled connections and disconnections, making the response to these incidents faster, avoiding major problems," added Engineer Mariño.
Structured cabling with modular components
The growth and modification of network requirements is inevitable, so network operators of commercial buildings must be able to adapt to these changes, impacting users as little as possible. This requires a well-planned structured cabling topology, with modular components that allow it to be flexible to adapt to new technology and higher speeds.
Along with these three aspects, there are others that can also help improve the reliability of the network and must be taken into account for a correct strategy:
- Ability to migrate to higher speeds with minimal network disruption
- Robust copper wiring system to support current and future PoE-powered devices
- Support for Wi-Fi, 4G/LTE and 5G mobile and multi-carrier networks
"Beyond the downtime that can occur due to network failures, there are many other important aspects that are affected if you do not have a reliable network within the company: failures in wireless communication within the building, disconnections of devices connected to the network and even failures in management systems, that can mean millionaire losses for companies or worse, data breaches that put at risk the security of people, companies or governments, "said Andrés Mariño, Senior Field Application Engineer at CommScope.
