Shenzhen World: Exhibition Center Displaying Intelligence

On September 28, 2019, the Phase I inauguration ceremony of the Shenzhen World Exhibition & Convention Center (Shenzhen World) was held in Shenzhen’s West Coast Great Airport Area. Shenzhen World’s completion demonstrates Shenzhen’s rapid development and highlights Huawei’s capabilities in building intelligent ICT systems.

Shenzhen World — Shenzhen’s New Showpiece

Shenzhen World is located at the top of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, the center of the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Economic Zone and Guangdong Free Trade Zone, and the convergence point of three megalopolis As a landmark project invested by the Shenzhen government, the project will play an important role in the future development of Shenzhen. When completed, Shenzhen World will become the world’s largest exhibition center with an indoor area of 500,000 m2 and will be Shenzhen’s new showpiece.

How Do We Build a World Leading Digital Exhibition Center?

“Shenzhen World is not just an exhibition center with another name, another design, and another contour. It is revolutionary in terms of functionality, positioning, and technology application. Therefore, our objective is to build an exhibition center that leads the world not only in terms of area and traffic, but also in the level of digitalization and industrial innovation,” said Ren Chunlei, the IT System Head of Shenzhen World. World-class first-generation smart exhibition halls entail industry-leading ICT networks, however, there are immense challenges in planning and designing the ICT network architecture. This is because of the diversified and complex requirements of the exhibition halls and the tidal traffic.

How do we provide self-service minute-level network provisioning services for exhibitors?

Exhibitors have different requirements for service networks, and time is short for booth construction. If the networks are deployed manually, the services may not be provisioned on time. Therefore, self-service network provisioning services should be provided so that exhibitors can provision network services just by purchasing bandwidth services based on the scenarios.

How do we quickly deploy and manage the network of the exhibition center?

As the world’s largest exhibition center, Shenzhen World will have over 40,000 information access points. This allows for the provisioning of diversified services such as IP phone, video conferences, Wi-Fi access, and Virtual Reality (VR). Thousands of network devices are required to provide network access for these services, and deploying and managing this large number of devices is a significant challenge.

How do we provide high-quality Wi-Fi services for 120,000 concurrent users in the exhibition halls?

Once opened, Shenzhen World is expected to receive a maximum of 400,000 people a day. The network should be designed to provide Wi-Fi access for 120,000 concurrent users (30 percent of maximum traffic), which poses significant challenges to WLAN construction.

How do we achieve intelligent operation of the exhibition halls?

Diversified and complex service requirements bring the exhibition halls numerous challenges. These include difficulties in unusual visitors, inefficient handling of security protection issues, ill-informed exhibition analysis and evaluation, lack of visibility into device status and refine management measures, high operation and labor costs, and unstable service quality.

Intent-Driven Network — Digitally Linking 400,000 People

Bringing optimal digital experiences to every spectator and exhibitor pose extremely high requirements for the digital construction of Shenzhen World. Based on its substantial level of experience in digital transformation and ICT, Huawei uses technologies including big data, AI, and cloud computing to build an Intent-Driven Network (IDN) solution. This features intelligent on-demand network, plug-and-play automatic deployment, and industry’s unique intelligent high-density Wi-Fi. Overall, this solution meets the requirements for the digital construction of Shenzhen World.

Intelligent on-demand campus network

Exhibitors need to purchase different network bandwidth services from operators for different scenarios. The operators use Huawei’s free mobility network technology to implement intelligent network selection for all exhibitors and spectators based on their identity information. This is done to achieve fast network provisioning and diversified value-added bandwidth operations. Huawei’s free mobility solution also provides network access control and good access experience for users, and uses innovative software and hardware designs to completely decouple network service policies from network locations. Exhibitors log in to the official platforms of Shenzhen World, such as the portal website and WeChat official account, register and apply for booths and network bandwidth services, and pay for the services. Then, the operation system of the exhibition center and the iMaster NCE controller of the campus network are used to provision network and diversified VIP bandwidth services for exhibitors in real time. Huawei IDN solution digitizes user experiences and applications on campus networks to bridge the gap between the business intent of the exhibition center and the physical network of the campus.

Plug-and-play automatic deployment

It is impossible to manually configure and deploy thousands of network devices one by one in the exhibition center. In the Huawei Intent-Driven CloudCampus Solution, IT administrators plan network resources and configurations on the iMaster NCE GUI. After network devices are installed, powered on, and connected in the exhibition halls, they are automatically registered on the iMaster NCE platform. Network configurations are automatically obtained and delivered without local configuration. The plug-and-play automatic deployment solution shortens the deployment time of network devices from three months to less than one week. This greatly improves the efficiency and in addition, this solution considerably reduces the subsequent maintenance workload for IT administrators. It also betters the O&M efficiency of the entire network, so fewer IT network O&M workers are needed in the exhibition center.

Industry’s Unique Intelligent High-Density Wi-Fi Solution

More than 8000 wireless APs are deployed based on the structure of each functional area in the exhibition center. This is done so that 120,000 people can enjoy high-quality Wi-Fi access at the same time. The most appropriate Wi-Fi coverage solutions are adopted for different areas. If the omnidirectional coverage is used, especially in standard exhibition halls with massive traffic, it is difficult to control the signal coverage area and the interference is severe. The traditional solution (APs plus external antennas) is complex and costly. In contrast, Huawei’s industry-leading wireless AP coverage solution with built-in 30-degree directional antennas achieves targeted coverage. This improves the overall user access concurrent rate by 50 percent in the standard exhibition halls. Both exhibitors and spectators can access the Wi-Fi network and enjoy optimal digital experiences, such as 4K video, VR, AR navigation, live broadcasts, and conference video uploading, anytime and anywhere the moment they enter the halls.

Intelligent Operations: Building the Next Generation Eco-Friendly Exhibition Center

Huawei’s HiCampus Solution integrates the converged communications system with the Intelligent Operation Center (IOC) to build an all-in-one application platform, based on the Huawei Horizon Digital Platform. This streamlines the entire exhibition process, from planning to removing exhibits, with the unified and platform-based operation management greatly improving the end-to-end operations efficiency of exhibition activities. In addition, Huawei has provided an exhibition command room that generates insights, assists resource utilization, and predicts problems. The command room enables intelligent operation monitoring, as well as intelligent command and dispatch. This ensures optimal routine operations and decision making for the exhibition halls. Indeed, the data plays a key role in eco-friendly operations, efficient decision-making, and sustainable development for the exhibition halls. “The IOC can not only manage data, but also dynamically adjusts the water, electricity, and gas supply. It can also configure equipment, monitor network connectivity, control the indoor environment, manage waste disposal, all based on crowd flow in the exhibition halls,” Ren Chunlei said. “We are striving to build an intelligent exhibition center with eco-friendly operations.”

Ren Chunlei said, “Shenzhen World stunned the world with its massive size and extremely short project time. Huawei is not only an end-to-end digital system provider, but also a reliable, trustworthy friend. Huawei has earned both our admiration and appreciation.”