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The Peninsula ShanghaiUnified Communications SolutionsSee how The Peninsula Shanghai implemented NEC Unified Communications solutions to improve guest service at the hotel.
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Shane Izaks General Manager, Information Technology The Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, Limited |
"Unified Communications simplifies how things work in a guestroom, and how we use our network to serve our guests." |
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Background
To launch a luxury hotel, The Peninsula Shanghai deployed cutting-edge technology.
The Peninsula Shanghai is the ninth property in The Peninsula Hotels' portfolio of luxury hotels, marking the return of The Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, Limited - Asia's oldest hotel company and the owning company of The Peninsula Hotels - to its original home after an absence of 55 years.
The Peninsula Hotels encompass nine award-winning properties in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Manila, New York, Beijing, Beverly Hills, Bangkok Chicago and Tokyo.
A homage to Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s, the Art Deco-inspired Peninsula Shanghai recreates the look and feel of this glamorous era when Shanghai was feted as "The Paris of the East," yet also offers the latest in state-of-the-art technology, services and amenities.
The hotel is in the newly redeveloped Waitanyuan neighborhood and has superior views of the Huangpu River, Pudong, The Bund and the gardens of the former British Consulate.
This mixed-use project consists of 235 Peninsula guestrooms and suites, high-end retail space, and 39 luxury residential units. Further amenities include five food and beverage outlets, including a jazz lounge, a signature Chinese restaurant, and a rooftop restaurant.
The new hotel also ramps up the brand's technology in order to serve, satisfy and provide guests with easy communications by keeping hotel staff in constant connection.
The Peninsula Shanghai complex has made NEC its preferred network solutions vendor to create an immediate and lasting impression with guests and other users.
NEC's unified communications streamline communications across the property, enriching the whole guest experience with improved service times, personalized assistance and quality communications.
Guests enjoy access to excellent service throughout the hotel, while management, concierge services and staff have immediate contact to the information and resources anytime and anywhere to provide guest service.
For example, thanks to real-time communication between staff, on arrival guests are escorted to the room without delay.
When a guest requests the laundry or shoe shine service, simply by touching a valet call button the message is immediately and automatically sent to the relevant housekeeping staff.
Installation Process
The guiding light was The Peninsula Hotels' growing reputation as the world's premier hotel group, demonstrating how easily a communications system can be deployed and adopted.
Shane Izaks on The Peninsula's collaboration with NEC:
"Once we had selected the core processes and core systems that we wanted to install, it was all about 'how' we put that solution into place."
Long a pioneer and industry leader in innovative hotel and guestroom technology, The Peninsula Hotels' philosophy is to provide intuitive and user-friendly technology to enhance the hotel experience for its guests, and so The Peninsula Shanghai is the latest to adopt this corporate mission.
For their newest property, converging voice and data on a single wire was the desired outcome, with 99.9% coverage over the large and stately property connecting staff instantly and continuously, thus expediting response times.
By running voice and data over the same network, The Peninsula Shanghai gives business travelers access to powerful communications tools right from their rooms.
The choice of partner was an important first step for The Peninsula Hotels, and it was vital therefore to identify a communications vendor that could not only provide ahead-of-the-game technology, but ideally one with a proven track record of Peninsula hospitality.
Shane Izaks, General Manager, Information Technology for The Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels, Limited, parent company of The Peninsula Hotels, says, "We looked around to identify the major players in the market, both worldwide and particularly in China. We looked at quite a few suppliers around the world, including NEC. We then carried out an open bid, and the proposal was best answered by NEC, who came through with all the items we required."
NEC was chosen as The Peninsula's partner because NEC could integrate voice and data with advanced technology, and as NEC has a proven track record of delivering reliable, high-performance solutions for maximum satisfaction to The Peninsula's guests.
Through NEC's UNIVERGE 360 approach to communications which places people at its center, both staff and guest needs are addressed with communications tailored to each individual's role or need - thus ensuring increased staff productivity and efficiency and guaranteeing that guests have easy access to all the services and amenities that the property offers.
The NEC/Peninsula Shanghai project was not the first between the two entities, or for Shane Izaks:
"Around the world, we've worked with NEC on quite a number of projects, including a worldwide area network connection with them, which gives us the capability, to utilize their equipment and infrastructure not only on property, but also across other operations with VoIP telephony and system in place."
Izaks continues:
"It's as simple as me picking up my phone in my office and calling the General Manager of The Peninsula New York by simply dialing the city number and his extension."
At The Peninsula Shanghai, the final installation was a large-scale collaboration - as the wireless LAN access points needed to be discreetly located behind walls and ceilings, the designers and builders worked closely with NEC, validating signal reception floor-by-floor as each story was constructed. When completed, the coverage included guestrooms, hallways, elevators, stairs, lobbies, common floor areas, driveways and even the pool area.
System Overview
The new solution is implemented by the IP Telephony server UNIVERGE SV8500, and the UNIVERGE wireless LAN (WLAN) system.
The solution provides the hotel and adjoining residential complex with innovative applications that are fully networked with each other and include comprehensive VoWLAN (Voice over WLAN) coverage throughout 99.9% of the facility, IP telephony and a complete interface between the property management systems and the hotel's Extra Low Voltage (ELV) system.
Izaks explains, "This is the second hotel where we've looked at a converged network, which means the infrastructure of cables to ride different networks on a single cable and have them integrate. One of the first things we did after looking at the vast size of the building (which comprises hotel, retail and residential complex) was to look at cabling infrastructure and install that converged network."
Moreover, the UNIVERGE SV8500's fully-linked network between the hotel and adjoining residential complex enables both hotel guests and permanent residents to enjoy the hotel's services.
In addition, NEC's VoWLAN handset, the UNIVERGE Terminal MH250, facilitates a broad range of staff to communicate seamlessly and flexibly, thus supporting the mobility of staff throughout The Peninsula complex and promoting responsiveness to guests' and residents' needs alike.
This allows service to be allocated floor-by-floor: "We have 12 floors of guest rooms. If the laundry valet service is requested on, say, the fourth floor, the call is first sent to the relevant valet for that floor. If for some reason he or she is unable to respond, then the message is automatically forwarded to the next level through an immediate escalation process", says Izaks.
The handset has an instant message feature, with Short Text Messaging used to relay guest service orders to the appropriate personnel. Guest names and room number information are sent to the handset from the PMS system via the server.
Approximately 2,000 wireless LAN access points have been invisibly installed, allowing wireless communications for a large number of handsets, Internet radio in the guestrooms, and even guests' laptop PCs.
NEC also provides IP-compatible, fixed line, multifunction UNIVERGE IP Phone DT700 series for back office use by hotel employees.
Ultimately, all of this positively impacts the guest experience, as Shane Izaks explains, "From a guest point of view, we have a simple network to serve a guest seamlessly, as we have 'subtle' technology in place behind the scenes that nobody knows is there."
OTHER NEC GUEST AMENITIES
The Peninsula Hotels' proprietary mulltiple communications devices are installed in each of the 235 guestrooms, allowing guests to request services or make outgoing calls integrated with the NEC SV8500 IP communications server. Each device is connected to the hotel's integrated network such as an easy-to-operate display telephone and bathroom speakerphone.
Installation Results and Future Benefits
By providing innovative communications services such as Unified Communications directly to its guests and staff, The Peninsula Shanghai has been able to stay on top in a highly competitive hospitality market.
Hotel guests have personalized services, fast answers, "first call" resolution, and access to advanced communications, while hotel staff enjoy mobility and constant collaboration, keeping them connected and available with front - and back-of-the-house access to information - plus real-time interactions with guests and colleagues.
The NEC solution has allowed the hotel and its staff to satisfy guests, burnish a reputation for excellent service and to maximize the efficiency of its workforce throughout the property.
Technically, the wireless technology that caters to voice, messaging and data in one single network is a home run. "Not many hotels around the world can claim 99.9% wireless coverage. Everywhere. Front of house, back of house, driveway, vicinity around the building, and so on. We can," so says Izaks.
And what does the future bring?
Mr. Izaks continues, "There are a lot of things we can do with the technology we've put into place. Use of IP is one of the things we'll be looking at. Video-on-demand is one, IP TV - delivery of TV over the same converged network."
And they won't be going it alone.
Opinions of NEC Staff
 Hiroo Ichii Senior Manager, 3rd Enterprise Communications Solutions Division NEC Corporation |
This was a challenging project for all involved at NEC. We've been working with The Peninsula Hotels for many years, so we understand their operations, their history, their future plans, and know that their prime objective is always providing superior service to their guests. With the grand new structure in Shanghai, NEC had the opportunity to deploy Unified Communications and technical convergence, with the aim of almost 99.9% coverage for both voice and data, which is especially challenging, since voice and data have different requirements, technology-wise. Another obstacle was to hide an enormous amount of access points. We worked closely with the general contractor, the cable contractor and the designer of the hotel on mounting all this equipment behind the walls and within the ceilings. It was a true collaboration with other partners, too. While the core technologies are NEC's and we designed the network, we worked with other companies to provide messaging services and integration with the property management system and guest information. The core system for Unified Communications is the NEC UNIVERGE SV8500 IP Telephony server. This technology is central to integrating and operating the network and controlling everything on a "converged network." What worked to both The Peninsula Shanghai's and NEC's advantage is that NEC has been immersed in the hospitality industry for years. We started with PBX, and have since worked on numerous projects and so we understand the operational requirements. What makes NEC unique in this sector is that we've cultivated many partners with many different applications, and so we can easily customize and integrate the different technologies to create unique solutions for each hotel we work with, all designed in unique ways. It's a great solution for the long run. By integrating all hotel network infrastructure under IP, we gave them the flexibility to add applications that will provide a variety of services for guest needs. Both guests and staff will have the added convenience of seamless wireless communications anywhere in the hotel premises. The system has a great future, as does The Peninsula Shanghai - and of course, NEC's relationship with The Peninsula Hotels. |
Network Design Overview
Customer profile
The Peninsula Shanghai
| Type of business | Hospitality |
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| Address | No.32 The Bund, 32 Zhongshan Dong Yi Road, Shanghai 200002 |
| Established | October 2009 |
| No. of Rooms | 235 guestrooms, 39 residential units |
