Case Study: MIT achieves reliable, high-capacity wireless and simplified management with Cisco Meraki

Providing reliable Wi-Fi service to hundreds in an extremely challenging environment

MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) needed to replace a failing legacy wireless system in the architecturally complex Stata Center — an 8‑story, 720,000 sq. ft. building housing 800+ faculty, staff and students — while meeting five goals: improve reliability, add capacity, overcome RF challenges, support fine‑grained network policies, and reduce management overhead. MIT selected Cisco Meraki, deploying Meraki’s cloud‑managed wireless solution including 80 dual‑radio access points and the Identity Policy Manager.

Cisco Meraki’s deployment used MRC and MIMO technologies, centralized event logging and remote‑troubleshooting tools, and IPM for per‑client VLAN and policy assignment. The result was dramatically improved coverage (eliminating previously “impenetrable” dead spots), a measured decrease in help‑desk tickets, faster diagnosis of client issues, and reduced management overhead—allowing MIT to meet all five original objectives.

MIT

Jack Costanza

Assistant Director