THE HENRY FORD ADDS WIRELESS CIRCUIT TO THEIR NETWORK

The Henry Ford campus (www.thehenryford.org) encompasses the Henry Ford Museum, Greenfield Village, the IMAX theatre, the Ford Rouge Factory Tour, and the Benson Ford Research Center and is a key historical landmark and year-round attraction located in Dearborn, MI. Their mission is to provide unique educational experiences based on authentic objects, stories, and lives from America's traditions of ingenuity, resourcefulness and innovation.


As the organization continues to add technology to their infrastructure, the need for high speed network connections has outgrown their T-1 circuits. With a higher capacity circuit needed between the Museum and the Rouge Factory Tour (3 miles away), their Information Technology department reviewed several options including running fiber, leasing a 10 Mbps full duplex circuit, or installing a wireless network.


The fiber option was too disruptive, costly, and would take too long as they needed the circuit up in 60 to 90 days. For 10 Mbps full duplex (10 up and down), the leased circuit had a significant recurring fee associated with it and did not leave a lot of room for growth. A licensed microwave solution on the other hand provided a 250 Mbps full duplex circuit, could be operational within the required timeframe, provided 99.999% to 100% calculated reliability, was a fraction of the cost of building out with fiber, and had an ROI of two (2) years.


With the decision made to investigate a wireless microwave circuit, The Henry Ford reached out to Trendset Communications Group (TCG) located in Sterling Heights, MI (www.tcg-pros.com). TCG specializes in wireless network design and installation focusing on outdoor wireless infrastructure. TCG provides turnkey services including design, engineering, site and material acquisitions, permitting and licensing, project management, construction, installation, and on-going network monitoring and support.


Trendset looked at several microwave technologies and based on a variety of criteria including form factor, ease of installation and configuration, RF specifications, financial strength of the manufacturer, and product (and spares) availability, chose the PTP800 from Cambium Networks. The choice paid off and the PTP800 started up and performed perfectly. The configuration wizard was a welcomed feature and insures that all required settings are entered prior to commissioning the link.


“We are very pleased with the performance of the technology as well as that of Trendset Communications,” explains Eric Reasons, Network Manager and Mike Butman, CIO for The Henry Ford Organization. “The team was able to get the circuit up and operational in time for the opening of our new event at the Ford Rouge Factory Tour.”

See the full press release attached.