Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company (NYSE: HPE), today announced that AmericasMart® Atlanta, the largest wholesale market center of its kind in the United States, is delivering a unique mobile experience for its global customers with Aruba’s Mobile First Platform. Its new network infrastructure enables AmericasMart to provide high-performance Wi-Fi across its 7.1 million square foot facility to enable faster, more secure sales transactions, and improved user engagement with its mobile app featuring turn-by-turn navigation.

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AmericasMart has enhanced their mobile app with critical blue-dot navigation and other capabilities ...

AmericasMart has enhanced their mobile app with critical blue-dot navigation and other capabilities using Aruba's Meridian location services platform and Aruba beacons. (Photo: Business Wire)

AmericasMart’s three interconnected buildings contain more than 1,500 permanent showrooms as well as exhibition halls, collectively housing 4.2 million square feet of product. Manufacturers, importers and designers of consumer gift, home furnishings and apparel products, curated from around the world and representing more than 9,000 different brands, exhibit at AmericasMart and its 16 annual tradeshows. AmericasMart generates an annual Atlanta economic impact of more than $561 million, as documented in independently conducted primary research, and brings more than 560,000 visitors to the city each year.

AmericasMart has designed its facilities to offer customers the advantage of transacting business with ease and efficiency in a single, fully contained environment and needed its network infrastructure to provide comparable benefits. Prior to its Aruba deployment, AmericasMart’s Wi-Fi network infrastructure was challenged to support its connectivity requirements and the large number of business transactions taking place during conventions and shows. Although AmericasMart has an existing mobile app with maps, the functionality lacked turn-by-turn navigation of the sprawling facility.

“As a leading global trading exchange and the premier U.S. destination for product sourcing across the home, gift and apparel spectrum, we want to ensure that our exhibitors and attendees have a superior on-site experience,” said Kimberly Rometo, Vice President of Digital and Information Systems for AmericasMart. “That demands the consistent enabling of fast, reliable and secure connectivity and a great mobile experience across our venue.”

After a thorough evaluation of its needs, AmericasMart chose Aruba for its network renovation. Working with partner, Driven Technologies of Norcross, Georgia, AmericasMart deployed Aruba 300 Series 802.11ac Wave 2 access points and Aruba Mobility Controllers. They also installed AirWave network management to enable full network visibility via a “single pane of glass”, and ClearPass for seamless, secure internal network access.

AmericasMart is also using the Meridian location services platform and Aruba Beacons which combine with the Aruba access points’ built-in Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons to enable accurate blue-dot navigation and turn-by-turn directions within the organization’s existing mobile app. The Meridian platform’s SDKs allow for easy integration of these capabilities and can accommodate additional features such as proximity notifications and asset tracking in the future, should AmericasMart decide to expand its app functionality further.

With the Aruba location services solution in place, the enhanced AmericasMart app will save attendees and exhibitors time by providing the most direct and efficient routes through the market center to find what they need. For exhibitors, the new network enables more secure and reliable sales transactions and access to their networks, while attendees can quickly and easily connect to the network with a single SSID.

Said Rometo, “With our new Aruba network, we can finally provide the mobile business experience that we’ve envisioned.”

“AmericasMart is one of our largest location services installation to date,” said Ozer Dondurmacioglu, General Manager for Aruba’s Meridian Location Services Group. “We’re excited to see the kinds of productivity benefits AmericasMart can realize with their deployment and the new mobile experience their exhibitors and attendees will now be able to access with AmericasMart’s location services-enabled app.”

About Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, is a leading provider of next-generation networking solutions for enterprises of all sizes worldwide. The company delivers IT solutions that empower organizations to serve the latest generation of mobile-savvy users who rely on cloud-based business apps for every aspect of their work and personal lives.

To learn more, visit Aruba at http://www.arubanetworks.com. For real-time news updates follow Aruba on Twitter and Facebook, and for the latest technical discussions on mobility and Aruba products visit Airheads Social at http://community.arubanetworks.com.