Indian Wells Tennis Garden & BNP Paribas Open
Record-Breaking Attendees
Internet
Gateways
Located in the heart of the Coachella Valley in the Southern California desert, the Indian Wells Tennis Garden is home to the annual BNP Paribas Open, often referred to as the “fifth Grand Slam” around the tennis industry.
The 2024 BNP Paribas Open event drew record-breaking crowds, with over 490,000 in attendance over the two-week tournament.
The state-of-the-art facility’s main court, Stadium 1, is the second-largest tennis stadium in the world.
CHALLENGE
- Guests with their usual messaging, social media, and live-streaming habits
- Cashless refreshment and merchandise point-of-sale systems across the venue
- On-site media outlets broadcasting live coverage from the tournament
- Livestream broadcasting of on-court action as well as incoming live streams of events going on elsewhere for guests to watch while on the grounds
- The venue’s all-digital ticketing system
The Solution
Recognizing that its existing public Wi-Fi gateways were unable to meet performance expectations — plus it needed far too much on-site management — Indian Wells turned to West Coast Networking, Inc. for a more robust, scalable solution with Nomadix Networks internet gateways.
“Nomadix stood out as the best choice due to its exceptional speed and expandability,” said Nick Messerschmidt, Senior Managed Service Network Engineer. “Unlike other systems, Nomadix offered reliable, high-performance connectivity that could effortlessly handle the heavy traffic and sudden spikes. Its scalability allowed us to efficiently manage varying crowd sizes without compromising on service quality. And its ease of management reduced the need for constant onsite technical support, making it a more efficient and cost effective solution compared to other options.”
In preparation for the BNP Paribas Open, the West Coast team installed 400 wireless access points across the 80-acre site, all of which relied on Nomadix Gateways on the back end. The system’s expandable and future-ready equipment provides the ability to add even more capacity when needed, and its secure traffic segmentation features provide added provisioning and peace of mind.
“We’re able to easily segment the vendors’ POS from individual users, for example, and isolate clients,” Messerschmidt said. “The gateway blocks malicious activity on the system, which bolsters security.”
The Nomadix Gateways also give network admins the ability to finetune end-user licensing and bandwidth allocation to maintain availability. For example, the Indian Wells team set up an automatic timeout, which cycles users off the network once they’ve gone idle for five minutes to dynamically free up bandwidth.
“We’ve seen significant quantifiable improvements across the network. Key elements of our event experience like the website and mobile app rely on Wi-Fi, and we were pleased to see a marked increase in reliability and performance.”
Philippe Dore, Chief Marketing Officer of the BNP Paribas Open
Outcome
During the 2024 BNP Paribas Open’s middle weekend, the network served over 28,500 simultaneous users within a 5-minute window, nearly hitting maximum capacity on the busiest day, without a single hiccup.
“We saw a dramatic increase in performance, the number of connections, and connection speed with the Nomadix equipment, with minimal load on the infrastructure because of the bandwidth control at the gateway,” Messerschmidt said. “And that’s all with a physically smaller footprint in terms of appliances and racks than the previous solution.”
User feedback on the system has been overwhelmingly positive, with a near-flawless experience for users on all fronts.
“We’ve seen significant quantifiable improvements across the network,” said Philippe Dore, Chief Marketing Officer of the BNP Paribas Open. “Key elements of our event experience like the website and mobile app rely on Wi-Fi, and we were pleased to see a marked increase in reliability and performance.”
In addition to robust, reliable technology, Messerschmidt said the outstanding support provided by the Nomadix team throughout the installation and onboarding process was a strong differentiator. He praised the team, their expertise and dedication for ensuring a seamless setup, which significantly minimized downtime and potential complications.
“I would highly recommend the Nomadix solution. It is an incredibly effective system that, once set up, operates smoothly without constant micromanagement,” Messerschmidt said. “The system has exceeded our expectations when handling high traffic volumes and providing a reliable user experience under heavy load. This makes it ideal for environments requiring robust and scalable connectivity.”