JoongAng Group Taps Juniper in Network Overhaul

South Korean media conglomerate JoongAng Group today announced it tapped Juniper Networks’ Mist platform to overhaul its wired and wireless network across its two locations in Seoul. South Korean media conglomerate JoongAng Group today announced it tapped Juniper Networks’ Mist platform to overhaul its wired and wireless network across its two locations in Seoul. JoongAng owns and operates one of the largest newspapers and broadcasting companies in South Korea. With the completion of its JTBC building in 2019, the JoongAng Group was expanding with its staff now split between two locations. The company wanted to deploy a network that provided seamless connectivity across both locations. To avoid configuration and authentication issues, JoongAng deployed a combination of Juniper’s Mist switches, WiFi 6 access points (APs), as well as the networking vendor’s newly launched WAN Assurance offering. WAN Assurance extends Mist’s artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities to identifying, logging, and triaging problems with the WAN. According to Juniper, this technology allows IT to quickly get to the bottom of network disruptions. For example, if a Zoom call were to go down, Mist’s AI capabilities would be able to identify if there was an issue with the WiFi, LAN, or the internet connection. In addition to providing wireless connectivity, JoongAng also highlighted the location tracking features enabled by Mist’s APs. The APs feature a virtual Bluetooth low-energy technology that enables indoor location tracking without the need for battery-powered beacons. This kind of technology has seen high demand in the wake of the pandemic as a means to facilitate contract tracing in the workplace. The system was initially deployed in the JTBC building during its construction and was followed by the JoongAng building earlier this year. Since acquiring Mist in 2019, Juniper has steadily extended the company’s AI capabilities to more of its product line. The company now plans to extend these capabilities to 128 Technology’s SD-WAN. “Our strategy to Mistify additional elements of our switching, enterprise routing, and security portfolio though the year is helping us take share from competitors and should create incremental pull-through opportunities for our enterprise offering in future periods,” Juniper CEO Rami Rahim said during the company’s second-quarter earnings call this summer. Mist has been a bright spot for the company’s financials. As of mid-year, Mist orders were up 170% year over year and new logos had increased by more than 100%. “Mist has now secured four Fortune 10 accounts,” Rahim boasted at the time. Mist also helped Juniper secure a leadership position in Gartner’s latest Wired and Wireless LAN Access Infrastructure Magic Quadrant report, in which Gartner praised the vendor’s rich AI and machine learning automation capabilities.