London, October 2018 – Genuine real-time access management, fast deployment and energy efficiency during operation: these were the key demands of the Maimónides Biomedical Research Institute of Cordoba (IMIBIC), part of the city’s university campus. To handle daily traffic of around 270 people, IMIBIC chose SMARTair™ Wireless Online electronic access control to secure the centre’s interior and exterior doors. The flexibility of a SMARTair™ system makes it easy for facility managers to program access rights tailored to each individual user, ensuring only the right people get access to the right areas, and only at the right times. The same system also comfortably manages much greater numbers of temporary visitors, during the Institute’s frequent external events.

“Using SMARTair™, the facilities and maintenance coordinator can supervise the state of building security in real time, and control who accesses the building and when,” says Jose Luis Torres Garcia Key Account Manager SMARTair™ Sur-Levante.

A single wireless system protects the main entrance; radioactivity, cytometry and genomics labs; operating rooms; and other sensitive areas, where trustworthy access management is critical. Authorised staff can also access another IMIBIC facility, inside the Reina Sofia University Hospital, with their credential.

Efficient and user-friendly

Because there’s no wiring, installation was fast and unobtrusive. Battery-powered devices are much more energy efficient than mains-powered access control. Maintenance is minimal; just a new standard battery every 40,000 cycles. Plus, there was no need for IMIBIC staff to swap their existing access card, because SMARTair™ is compatible with all major RFID technologies.

The powerful functionality of SMARTair™ Wireless Online management enables facilities managers to admit staff remotely, from anywhere, should someone lose or forget their credential. Using the intuitive Wireless Online system software, a real-time overview of access system status is easily generated at any time. It’s also simple to issue timed access control permissions tailored to the needs, responsibilities and profile of every individual site user.

With two years’ use — and several fire drills successfully completed — SMARTair™ has been thoroughly and successfully tested in IMIBIC’s demanding security environment.

London, September 2018 – Ask a student, or pretty much anyone, what they think about “access control” and you’ll get a shrug. Conversely, all of us are enthusiastic about security and convenience. Students across Europe are discovering SMARTair® wireless access control gives them both.

Adding SMARTair® access control to a door involves just replacing a standard cylinder or escutcheon with a digital, smartphone- or smart-card–operated electronic lock. It’s hassle-free to make the switch to to SMARTair®. And with a system design focused on user experience, SMARTair® takes some of the everyday pain out of student life.

Wherever you fit SMARTair®, it’s easy to configure access cards to enable payments in the canteen or at vending machines; for changing room locker locks; and for the photocopier or library loans. You can’t do that with a metal key.

At Madrid’s prestigious Colegio Universitario de Estudios Financieros (CUNEF) students now open doors with smart MIFARE® RFID cards instead of keys. CUNEF fitted escutcheons to monitor and ease access to different areas of the university for 1,600 students, without the need for expensive wired door locks. If a student loses their card, there’s no threat to campus security. A manager issues a new credential which automatically cancels the lost card — much faster than changing a lock.

When Mezzino took ownership of Rialto Court — apartments for students attending Durham University and Teesside University — they replaced a mechanical master key system with SMARTair®. From the company’s point of view, the high annual tenant turnover and a need for scheduled cleaning and summer shutdown were becoming difficult to manage with physical keys.

Students also reaped the benefits of their new, user-friendly access system. They have the confidence no previous resident of their flat has copied a physical key.

At Funway Academic Resort in Madrid, student rooms are also locked with SMARTair® escutcheons. Energy-saving wall devices inside rooms regulate electricity use, and students each have their own safe locked with a SMARTair® cabinet lock. The Funway gym, study rooms, games rooms, swimming pool and changing rooms, spa and staff areas are also locked with SMARTair® escutcheons — and open with the same smart-card.

A mobile generation
There’s more to come from SMARTair®. The recent launch of the SMARTair® Openow™ solution puts credentials on a mobile phone. With SMARTair® and the Openow™ app, students can open their rooms and authorized doors with a smartphone. If you have your phone, you’re already carrying your keys.

Student services or facilities managers issue virtual keys over-the-air — and can revoke them whenever they choose — so there’s no need for a key-card handover meeting, at the beginning or end of term. A time-limited virtual key arrives ahead of the first day and automatically expires when it’s time to vacate your halls.

Mobile credentials will be a big hit. Student life goes on inside the handset, as much as IRL (“In Real Life”, for the uninitiated). Last year’s Deloitte Mobile Consumer Survey found a fifth of 18- to 24-year-olds even check their phone for messages in the middle of the night*.

From a security standpoint, phone-based credentials have another advantage. Checking our phones is “habitual”, “unconcscious” and “repetitive”, according to one study**. We know very quickly if it is missing. How soon would you notice a missing plastic card, especially if you were enjoying yourself on a night out?

Plus a virtual key on every student’s smartphone potentially provides an extra layer of biometric protection for every controlled university door. Fingerprint, and even face and iris, scanners are commonplace on smartphones.

The next step
”Generation Z students were raised as digital natives,” says Felix Moran, SMARTair® Product Manager at ASSA ABLOY. ”They expect convenience as a standard feature, not a mechanical solution used in Ancient Egypt.

”In Europe’s increasingly international, marketized higher education ecosystem, attracting these tech-savvy students is critical, as is keeping them satisfied with the campus experience.”

The complete SMARTair® solution includes wireless escutcheons, cylinders, wall readers, locker locks and more; the intuitive SMARTair® TS1000 software; and the enhanced new Openow™ app functionality. It works out the box and is easy to install — and even easier to operate.

You can manage a campus more efficiently — and make students happier — with SMARTair® wireless access control. Learn more about the Openow™ app at https://campaigns.assaabloyopeningsolutions.eu/openow

Wireless door devices, locker locks and wall readers put accommodation managers in total control

Given the choice, would you rather run security at a bank vault or at student halls of residence? At least the bank job is straightforward: keep the money inside, and everyone else out. If only protecting hundreds of young people was so easy.

Student accommodation blocks are usually large, with high traffic moving from bedrooms to common areas, canteens and libraries. A single resident travelling between her room, a study area, the gym and a couple of trips offsite would use secure doors 15 times a day. In a residence housing just 200 students, that’s 3,000 daily events for the access system to handle.

Rapid student turnover puts a further admin burden on facility managers. Imagine, among hundreds of students living at the halls, just a handful leave or arrive each semester. That’s a couple of manual key handovers to schedule every week, and to chase if a key-holder fails to appear. If keys are not handed in, is a room really secure for its next occupant? And how can you know if one has been copied? With physical keys and mechanical locks, security lacks flexibility, and it’s impossible to get a site overview without a time-wasting manual key audit.

Today’s students, tomorrow’s secure solutions

Mechanical security is not the answer, because mechanical locks don’t offer the control or flexibility managers need. There’s no real-time monitoring, and you can’t generate detailed audit trails for locks or users, meaning there’s no easy way to track unauthorised access — in cases of a theft, for example.

The current crop of students — so-called “Generation Z” — were raised as digital natives. They expect convenience as a standard feature, not a mechanical solution first used in Ancient Egypt. In Europe’s increasingly international, marketised higher education system, attracting these tech-savvy students and keeping them satisfied with the campus experience are critical.

The SMARTair™ wireless access system is built to meet the challenges of securing a student residence:

1. A system needs the product and software robustness to handle so many users, high traffic, and fast resident turnover. SMARTair™ has it.

2. A system should make student life easier with cards, rather than keys. SMARTair™ does.

3. A system should secure more than just doors, including cabinet locks and devices to protect secure areas like car parks. SMARTair™ does.

4. A system must be easy to upgrade in the future, both adding new doors and upgrading the functionality of the devices already installed. SMARTair™ is; it future-proofs your investment.

5. A system should be able to handle additional student services like the vending machines and canteen on the same credential card as the room door lock. SMARTair™ can.

A wireless access control system like SMARTair™ solves admin problems with a combination of control and cost-effectiveness. It is based on battery-powered locks and is easy to retrofit wirelessly to existing premises or incorporate in a new-build. Installers simply swap the existing mechanical lock for a wireless device and link the door to the management software.

Slim, robust SMARTair™ devices can secure almost any opening. Escutcheons (with optional keypad for added security) are ideal for student bedrooms, and fit wood or glass, emergency exit and even fire doors. Available with or without PIN entry, SMARTair™ wall readers can filter lift, main door or car park access. The SMARTair™ knob cylinder is easy to retrofit to management offices; you just replace an existing mechanical cylinder with the SMARTair™ device. For storing belongings, SMARTair™ cabinet and locker locks are configurable in the same system without the need for an extra module.

With SMARTair™, students come and go using programmable smart cards, tags, or even the secure SMARTair™ mobile app — not a cumbersome, easy-to-lose key. SMARTair™ devices support all major RFID technologies. Plus, students only need carry one credential to open their door and access additional onsite services. A single card to unlock their room, secure their belongings inside a locker, enter the library, pay for photocopying and buy lunch makes sense for them. It’s another step to boosting resident convenience.

And because SMARTair™ devices run on standard batteries, the system is also cost-effective for accommodation providers.

Already trusted by students all over Europe

SMARTair™ is already making life easier for student residence managers all over Europe, including at Mezzino’s Rialto Court in Middlesbrough, UK (www.mezzino.co.uk). “We are so pleased with the result. We are already looking to adopt the access control system for the other student accommodation properties we manage nationwide,” says James McGrath, Mezzino’s co-owner and director.

At Funway Academic Resort in Madrid (www.funwayresort.com), student rooms are locked with SMARTair™ escutcheons. Energy-saving wall devices inside rooms regulate electricity use, and students have an individual safe fitted with a SMARTair™ cabinet lock. Students and staff open all their authorised doors with the same access card: the Funway gym, study rooms, games rooms, swimming pool and changing rooms, spa and staff areas are also locked with SMARTair™ escutcheons.

“The system meets the expectations we had and offers very easy maintenance,” says Mario Arias, Facility Manager at Funway.

To discover how SMARTair™ can upgrade student security and put you in total control of your halls of residence, visit www.tesa.es/smartair-students