Ten billion mobile devices will be in use by 2016.1 People love their smartphones, tablets, and other devices, and they want to stay connected at home, at work, and on the go. This gives you a great opportunity to engage customers and visitors with an exciting, innovative mobile experience. But how can you provide the dependable, high-quality access people want and create unique, revenue-generating services, yet keep your network safe and manageable? The Cisco® Mobility Services Engine (MSE) makes it easy to roll out new Wi-Fi-based solutions and services - safely and securely. This flexible platform gives you a centralized, scalable way to deliver rich mobility services:
• Get deeper network insight. Base Location services capture and bring together key network information such as device location, RF spectrum details, and sources of RF interference. They also let you support a rich set of real-time location services (RTLS).
• Give people the mobile experience they want with location-based services. Cisco Connected Mobile Experiences (CMX) lets enterprises and service providers deliver customized location-based mobile services to people in retail stores, hospitals, hotels, and other environments. You can offer a personalized mobile experience at the right time and the right place - and understand users better with onsite, online, and social analytics.
• Keep wireless users and your network safe. Cisco Wireless Intrusion Prevention System (wIPS) helps protect the network from wireless threats, rogue wireless devices, and denial-of-service (DoS) attacks. It provides the tools you need to strengthen security and improve compliance.
Product Benefits
The Cisco MSE with Base Location, CMX, and wIPS lets companies of all kinds unlock the benefits of mobility (Table 1).
Table 1. MSE Benefits
Industry
Solution
Retail
• Engage shoppers with compelling mobile services such as retail apps with way-finding services
• Stop "showrooming" and close more sales with context-sensitive web-based campaigns
• Track online, onsite, and social customer trends and identify high-value shoppers
• Help meet Payment Card Industry (PCI) requirements
Healthcare
• Increase patient satisfaction with way-finding apps and mobile location services
• Track equipment anywhere with connected medical devices
• Help meet Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requirements
Transportation
• Understand aggregate traveler trends and serve them better through planning and efficiency with tracking and location analytics
• Captivate passengers with augmented reality applications such as interactive maps and way-finding services
Hospitality
• Improve the guest experience with business-friendly, highly secure Wi-Fi, location-based visitor services, and other engaging hospitality offerings
• Learn more about guests with location and social analytics, for better planning and efficiency
Technology Overview
Designed as an open platform, the Cisco MSE supports mobility services software with a modular approach. So you can set up options based on your network topology or the types of services you offer. But the true value of the MSE is delivered through its support for mobility services applications. Table 2 provides an overview of the APIs, services, and platforms available.
Table 2. Mobility Services Overview
Feature
Benefits
Mobility Services API
• Lets developers create location-based applications and services
Services
Base Location license
• Track and locate interferers, rogues, Wi-Fi clients, and RF tags
• Detect presence and receive geo-fenced or zone-based alerts
• Show systemwide interferer details and correlation
• Visualize interferer zone of impact
• Develop custom applications with open location API wIPS
• Discover and stop security penetration and DoS attacks
Connected Mobile Experiences (CMX) license
• Manage visitors and increase brand presence with location-aware onboarding and visitor management
• Engage customers through location-enabled mobile web and social campaigns
• Analyze online, onsite, and social customer behavior
• Develop and measure targeted, location-based web campaigns
Platform
• Physical appliance
• Virtual appliance
Cisco Base Location License: Advanced Spectrum Services
Cisco CleanAir® technology makes it easy to monitor and manage your network's RF conditions. The Cisco MSE extends CleanAir's capabilities (Table 3).
Table 3. CleanAir with MSE Offers
CleanAir Access Points with Wireless LAN Controller (WLC)
CleanAir Access Points with WLC and MSE
Detect, classify, and mitigate interferers
Yes
Yes
Provide systemwide interferer and event correlation
No
Yes
Perform zone-of-impact analysis
No
Yes
Locate interferers on a map
No
Yes
Cisco Base Location License: Real-Time Location Services (RTLS)
The Cisco MSE provides presence detection and real-time location tracking, including track and trace of rogue devices, interferers, Wi-Fi clients, smartphones, and RFID tags.
Cisco Base Location License: Mobility Services API
The Mobility Services API with support for representational state transfer (REST) and Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP)/XML enables customers and partners to tightly integrate MSE location information into applications, such as location-aware equipment tracking, guest access, device-based services, browser-based services, mobile apps, online and onsite analytics, social analytics, and ads and offers.
Cisco Connected Mobile Experiences: Advanced Business Platform for Wi-Fi Services
CMX uses location data to create detailed business analytics and customer engagement applications, including:
• CMX Connect: This location-enabled captive portal enables you to create a custom onboarding and landing experience for your customers and better understand visitor behavior while in the venue. Web or social authentication enables easy onboarding to the Wi-Fi network.
• CMX Analytics: Onsite analytics show you how, where, and when customers and visitors are moving throughout a venue. Online analytics shows you top visited websites and metrics for online mobile promotions. Social analytics deliver valuable insight into your customer base through demographic data from users who check in, such as age, gender, city (origin), and language.
• CMX Browser Engage: Revolutionize the mobile experience with location and context-aware mobile browser marketing capabilities. Customers and visitors can benefit from nearby services, indoor navigation, targeted promotions, and other informational services just by using their mobile device browser.
• CMX Dashboard: This location services management tool enables organizations to build and measure context-aware, targeted marketing campaigns. They can view authentications, browser campaign adoption (click-throughs) by particular zones, device types, top websites visited per zone, and more.
• CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi allows organizations to extend a seamless Wi-Fi sign-on experience to guests and analyze their in-venue behavior using the Cisco and Facebook Wi-Fi platforms. It uses a software connector to enable end users to authenticate to the Cisco Wi-Fi network and automatically "check-in" to the venue's Facebook profile to increase brand recognition. Solution benefits include:
– Increased brand exposure through automated Facebook venue check-in with news feed streaming and increased rankings for the Graph Search and Nearby Facebook features.
– Ability to gain valuable insight into your customer base through demographic data from users who check in.
– Ability to deliver targeted advertisements to users who check in and to increase conversion with venue relevancy and social context.
Table 4 provides a detailed comparison of the features offered with the Base Location and CMX licenses.
Table 4. MSE Licenses Comparison
Feature
Base Location License
CMX License
Advanced spectrum, location tracking, presence detection, API
Adding more devices to the network means new compliance concerns and unknown risks. The Cisco wIPS monitors, mitigates, and reports malicious activity on the wireless network, including rogue access points, security penetration attacks, and DoS threats. It helps you reduce liability, protect your reputation, and stay in regulatory compliance. Part of the wIPS solution is available through the wireless LAN controller (WLC). Add the MSE for more features and value.
Table 5 compares the capabilities of the WLC and the WLC plus MSE.
Table 5. Cisco wIPS Comparison
Feature
Base wIPS (WLC)
MSE wIPS (WLC plus MSE)
Rogue access point and ad hoc rogue detection, classification, location tracking, and containment
Yes
Yes
Switch port tracing and disabling
Yes
Yes
DoS attack identification and classification
No
Yes
Wireless intrusion attack identification and classification
No
Yes
Active attack mitigation
No
Yes
MSE Product Specifications
Table 6 provides the specifications of the physical Cisco MSE appliance. Table 7 provides the specifications of the virtual MSE.
Four hot-swappable 146-GB SAS drives with up to 6-Gbps transfer rate
Removable media
DVD-RO drive
Ports
• Four USB ports: Two in front, two in back
• Two VGA ports: One in front and one in back
• One RJ-45 management port for out-of-band management
• RJ-45: Two rear RJ-45 connectors for connection to two Gigabit Ethernet network adapters
Connectivity
Network: Two embedded multifunction Gigabit Ethernet network adapters with TCP/IP offload engine
Management
SNMP v1, v2c, and v3
Management interface
Cisco Prime™ Infrastructure
Network devices
• All WLCs
• All 802.11n access points
System specifications
• Number of MSEs per Prime Infrastructure: 20
Programming interfaces
REST and SOAP/XML APIs
Form factor
1 rack unit (1RU)
Physical dimensions
• Height: 1.69 in. (43 mm)
• Width: 17.3 in. (440 mm)
• Depth: 28.0 in. (711.4 mm)
• Weight: 28 (minimum) to 35.1 lb (maximum) (12.7 to 15.9 kg)
Power
• AC power supply wattage: 625W
• AC power supply voltage: 100 to 120V at 50 to 60 Hz; 200 to 240V at 50 to 60 Hz
• 92% efficient
• Autoswitching, hot-swappable
• Redundant power supplies
Cooling fans
Total of six fans, 3+3 redundant configuration
Environmental
• Operating temperature:
• 50° to 95°F (10° to 35°C) up to 3000 ft (914.4 m)
• 50° to 90°F (10° to 32°C) 3000 to 7000 ft (914.4 to 2133 m)
• Non-operating temperature:
• -40° to 140°F (-40° to 60°C)
• Maximum rate of change is 36°F/hr (20°C/hr)
• v air temperature, server on:
• 50° to 95°F (10° to 35°C)
• Altitude: 3000 ft (0 to 914.4 m), decrease system temperature by 1.0°C (1.8°F) for every 1000-foot (304.8 m) increase in altitude
• v air temperature, server off:
• 41° to 113°F (5° to 45°C)
• Maximum altitude: 10,000 ft (3048 m)
• Shipment:
• -40° to 140°F (-40° to 60°C)
• Maximum altitude: 10,000 ft (3048 m)
• v humidity, server on:
• 20% to 80%
• Maximum dewpoint: 70°F (21°C)
• Maximum rate of change: 9°F/hr (5°C/hr)
• v humidity, server off:
• 8% to 80%
• Maximum dewpoint: 81°F (27°C)
Approvals and compliance
• Safety UL 60950
• CAN/CSA -C22.2 No. 60950
• EN60950
• IEC 60950: EMC FCC Part 15 (CFR 47) Class A
• ICES-003 Class A
• EN 55022 Class A
• CISPR22 Class A
• AS/NZS 3548 Class A
• VCCI Class A
• EN 55024
• EN 50082-1
• Energy Star compliant
All listed server resources should be reserved/dedicated for the virtual machine running the MSE virtual appliance. For hard drive configuration, a thick configuration should be used.
UCS-HDD300GI2F208 300GB SAS 15K RPM 3.5 inch HDD/hot plug/drive sled mounted
UCS-HDD300GI2F208 300GB SAS 15K RPM 3.5 inch HDD/hot plug/drive sled mounted
UCS-HDD300GI2F208
300GB SAS 15K RPM 3.5 inch HDD/hot plug/drive sled mounted
UCS-RAID-9266CV
MegaRAID 9266CV-8i w/TFM + Super Cap
UCS-RAID-9266CV
MegaRAID 9266CV-8i w/TFM + Super Cap
UCS-RAID-9266CV
MegaRAID 9266CV-8i w/TFM + Super Cap
UCSC-PSU-650W 650W power supply for C-Series rack servers
UCSC-PSU-650W 650W power supply for C-Series rack servers
UCSC-PSU-650W 650W power supply for C-Series rack servers
R2XX-DMYMPWRCORD
No power cord option
R2XX-DMYMPWRCORD No power cord option
R2XX-DMYMPWRCORD
No power cord option
CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi Product Specifications
1. All listed server resources should be reserved\dedicated for the virtual machine running the virtual instance of CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi. For hard drive configuration a thick configuration should be used.
2. All listed specs are minimum requirements.
3. CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi will be provided as a single OVA file.
4. One VM running a CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi instance is required per location or store, as Facebook social analytics are tied to a physical location.
5. CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi needs a Cisco IOS® Software router configured for Policy-Based Routing (PBR) to redirect guest Wi-Fi traffic. PBR performance varies depending on the router model.
6. CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi can run centrally if guest Internet breakouts are from the data center, or alternately, it can run on the Cisco UCS E-Series blades on branch office Cisco ISR G2 routers in a distributed fashion if Internet breakouts are local.
Table 9. Cisco CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi Product Specifications
Feature
Cisco MSE Virtual Appliance for CMX for Facebook Wi-Fi
VMware ESXi version (virtual appliance on a customer-supplied server)
VMware ESXi version 4.1 or 5.0 or 5.1
Minimum server requirements
• Minimum RAM: 4GB
• Minimum hard disk space allocation: 250 GB with SAS drivers and 900 IOPS
• Processors: 4 vCPUs at 1.0 GHz or faster and a passmark (cpubenchmark.net) no less than 4000
For More Information
• To learn more about how the Cisco MSE can help you unleash the potential of mobility, visit htttp://www.cisco.com/go/mse.
