It’s been a bit busy as of late. The holiday seasons are just around the corner, and wireless is in the cloud.

The word “Cloud” is such a hot word right now. Everything these days is starting to move to the ‘cloud’.  Most vendor marketing folks end with something along the lines of “..AND rest assure, your data will be in the “Cloud”…Then everyone soils at the thought of their data being in the cloud with; with no inclination, no questions on how their data will get there, the security of their data, or, or if their current infrastructure can support it! GAH!

In any case, yes wireless is now being offered in the Cloud, and at the for front of this is Meraki. Meraki was founded in 2006 by MIT students and was acquired by Cisco in 2012. Since then they have been offering wireless hardware and services to mainly enterprise entities. They provide a suit of hardware and services ranging from APs, switches, firewalls, phones and more.  I find their hardware to be modern, it kind of reminds me of Apple; sleek, minimalist design and easy to install. They have an intuitive management dashboard that provides administration and configuration of your devices. You can even leverage the analytical data captured by APs for targeted advertisement to your customers.

Want to learn more about Meraki? Want a free AP? For a short time, Meraki is giving away a free AP if you attend one of their hosted webinars. If you’re lucky, you may even get a switch! Here’s the link https://meraki.cisco.com/freeap

Mike