Ruckus Wireless has announced that YOU Broadband has selected and deployed its ZoneFlex 802.11n system as a managed Wi-Fi service offering within India’s largest airport, Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (CSIA) operated by Mumbai International Airport Pvt. Ltd (MIAL).

YOU Broadband has installed Ruckus ZoneFlex 7300 series 802.11n smart Wi-Fi access points throughout CSIA’s international and domestic terminals and is initially offering free multimegabit Wi-Fi services to millions passengers that transit the airport every year. CSIA operates five terminals over an operational area of 1,450 acres – handling over 29.1 million passengers and 670,235 tons of cargo in 2010. 

The Ruckus Wireless network, within CSIA, is managed by redundant ZoneDirector 3100 smart WLAN controllers located at YOU Broadband’s network operations center.  FlexMaster, a system-wide Wi-Fi services management platform developed by Ruckus, is also being used for gathering user’s statistics, monitoring network traffic, generating trending information and remote diagnostics and troubleshooting.

YOU Broadband is leveraging Wi-Fi within CSIA to offer mobile gaming, free Internet access and ultimately video on demand services to airport visitors. YOU Broadband plans to partner with device makers and content providers to offer value-added content services over Wi-Fi.

With renewed interest in Wi-Fi, service providers around the world are looking to offer managed enterprise wireless LAN services within hotels, public venues, universities and other locations.  This allows service providers to easily extend the availability of branded broadband services, attract new subscribers and provide a valuable network services to enterprises interested in divesting from having to own and operate elaborate network infrastructure.

The Ruckus ZoneFlex system has now become the wireless standard for a number of airports around the world including: Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA), Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Budget Terminal in Singapore and Larnaca airport in Cyprus.