A conversation about DAS and Wi-Fi with James Hammond, Director of Information Technology, Carolina Panthers, and Kevin Schmonsees, CTO, Beam Wireless
The below is only a summary. Download a transcript of the complete interview and the full report “Massively densified networks. Why we need them and how we can build them.”
Stadiums and other sports venues are typically the first targets of densification because of the extremely high usage density during events. We talked about wireless coverage with DAS and Wi-Fi at the Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina, with James Hammond, the Director of Information Technology with the Carolina Panthers, and Kevin Schmonsees, the CTO of Beam Wireless.
Fans want to have in a stadium the same experience as they do anywhere else – and this is so crucial to their experience that stadium owners see it as a top priority, to the point that they may decide to own it and take full control of it. James told us: “It is a scary thing to bring a third-party managed system in house and take full responsibility for that. That was a scary decision, but it was the right decision to make. Because we’ve got a saying here. Our owner, Jerry Richardson, says that the fan is the most valuable member of our team.”
And to keep fans happy, both DAS and Wi-Fi are needed. Kevin, who manages the DAS is a big supporter of Wi-Fi: “I’ll say, “Please use it.” It’s funny: because I handle the DAS side, the expectation would probably be that I wouldn’t care that much about Wi-Fi. But I am thrilled to see the new Wi-Fi system going into the stadium, because the biggest help for the DAS is to have that Wi-Fi data offload.”
We further discussed the topic of densification during our recent webinar. Download the webinar.
