The 7-Year Horizon
A network infrastructure investment needs to serve your property for at least 7 years. That means decisions today must account for visible trends and leave room for surprises.
Layer 1: Cabling Is Forever
Run Cat6A everywhere. The marginal cost over Cat6 is minimal but the future-proofing is significant.
Planning essentials:
Extra conduit:30% spare capacity for future runs
Fiber backbone:Between floors and buildings
PoE++ budget:For next-gen APs and IoT devices
Management: Cloud-First
Cloud-managed networking eliminates the forklift upgrade problem. Firmware updates, policy changes, and monitoring happen continuously.