Foundry Networks (News - Alert) Inc., a performance and total solutions provider for end-to-end switching and routing, has announced that Garmin International (News - Alert), Inc., has selected Foundry’s IronPoint Mobility Controller MC3000 and IronPoint Mobility Access Point MA208s for an end-to-end wireless local area network (WLAN) campus deployment.

To improve business operations, Garmin is leveraging the IronPoint Mobility Series advanced Quality of Service (QoS) features and next-generation Virtual Cell architecture. This set up provides highly scalable wireless capacity and seamless roaming to Garmin mobile users across the network, all while maintaining the highest level of data privacy and access control.

The large size of Garmin’s operations requires mobile barcode scanners with wireless connectivity as a critical part of the inventory management infrastructure. To ensure secure data communications, all mobile scanners use Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2) with 802.1x authentication.

Garmin looked to Foundry Networks and their next-generation Virtual Cell architecture in the IronPoint Mobility Series to enable these highly mobile barcode scanners to roam seamlessly across the entire network without delay, packet-loss or latency.

Garmin ensures traffic from the mobile barcode scanners is prioritized over other wireless devices by utilizing the advanced QoS features in the IronPoint Mobility Series. As a result, Garmin is able to maximize the wireless investment by fully using the available wireless bandwidth without affecting business-critical applications.

As a designer, manufacturer, marketer and seller of navigation, communication and information devices and applications – most of which are enabled by Global Positioning System (GPS) technology – Garmin has a substantial place in the consumer and general aviation navigation market. Its products serve the automotive/mobile, outdoor/fitness, marine and aviation markets.

The company shipped more than 5.4 million units in 2006 and has shipped 3.09 million in the first two quarters of 2007 according to the company’s public financial statements.

"We are very pleased that Garmin, a leader and innovator in GPS navigation and communication equipment, has selected Foundry's new IronPoint Mobility Series to strengthen their existing WLAN, increase mobile productivity and improve their crucial business operations," said Bob Schiff, vice president and general manager for Foundry's Enterprise Business Unit, in a Tuesday statement.

"Foundry's IronPoint Mobility Series provides Garmin's employees with seamless roaming, robust security and high performance and their network system administrators with a secure, scalable and high-density WLAN solution with advanced features to provide a high performance wireless infrastructure."

In an environment such as Garmin’s productivity can have a significant impact on the bottom line. When operations depend upon wireless communications, security is also of the utmost importance. As a result, the company sought a solution that could not only improve the security of its crucial wireless devices, but also improve productivity and turned to Foundry to get such results.

The solution’s performance over the long term will provide the true test of the benefit it will provide to Garmin. Quick adoption and ease-of-use will determine its immediate success and will better position it favorably with internal operations in the long run.