MWC Barcelona: A behind the scenes look at the numbers

You might have seen my last post and all the great things we (Cisco) had going on at MWC Barcelona. In case you didn’t, here’s the link.

For those not familiar with MWC Barcelona, it’s the world’s largest wireless show held at one of Europe’s largest venues, the Fira de Barcelona Gran Via Venue in Spain.

As mentioned in my previous post, the MWC Barcelona network is built on Cisco wired and wireless solutions. For the event, the team utilized the AI/ML engine in Cisco DNA Center to optimize connectivity, power consumption, and data throughput. In addition, Cisco DNA Spaces was used for location analytics and environmental data as part of the show’s health and safety plan. Lastly, WBA OpenRoaming helped guests and vendors seamlessly and securely connect to the wireless network, automatically authenticating them through a number of identity providers.

Now this is all great but let’s look at some of the numbers and outcomes:

Scale and scope

MWC Barcelona saw 61,000+ attendees this year! Live events are back in full force!

Cisco Catalyst Wi-Fi and switching provided connectivity across the show

• 100K+ OpenRoaming authentications, 38K peak per day
• 80% of OpenRoaming identities were from service providers. The remaining 20% came from other identities including Samsung Galaxy and Google Pixel devices which natively authenticate to OpenRoaming networks
• Cisco DNA Spaces provided location and environmental data that was used as part of the show’s health and safety program. With this year’s success, Fira will start exploring next-generation applications such as location-based services and push notifications for vendors
• Cisco Wi-Fi 6E at the booth, provided 1+ gig connectivity, up and down. Demonstrated using Samsung Galaxy devices
• Cisco Catalyst 9000 POE switches provided gigabit data speeds and 90 watts of power per port to networked devices across the show

Next Generation connectivity

• AI Enhanced RRM completely eliminated co-channel interference, 100%. Even on 2.4 GHz channels.
• DNA Center Wireless 3D Analyzer enabled IT to uniquely visualize Wi-Fi gaps and proactively address them to provide consistent experiences
• Device analytics provided connection details from various devices to support troubleshooting and provide better experiences.
• Umbrella Security protected the network and endpoints from potential threats

Demo’s in the Cisco NOC

• Cisco Catalyst and Meraki Access Points with the ConvergeX Ultra Wide Band location tracking solution, demonstrated the ability to simultaneously track thousands of devices using Samsung Galaxy phones and ConvergeX tags.
• SLA-based Wi-Fi with Intel showcased the ability to drive a new breed of low-latency applications for industrial, healthcare, and manufacturing use cases

Learn how Cisco Wi-Fi can drive your network

Additional Resources

See how DNA Spaces can help with your health and safety plans

Check out Cisco Catalyst switches

Learn how Cisco DNA Center simplifies the running of your network