Aruba

A WiFi assurance sensor designed to live in high end corporate offices and disappear until something goes wrong. This was a deliberate break from the squircle shaped white boxes that previously defined the category.

The Brief

After HPE Aruba acquired Cape Networks in 2018, the team needed to rebrand and redesign the sensor for Aruba's enterprise customer base. The brief: keep the simple install experience the original Cape sensor was known for, but make the device feel like it belonged in the same architectural grade office it was monitoring.

Constraints

The device had to fit inside the standard Aruba mounting ecosystem, support PoE, and tolerate every common wall box configuration installers use in the field. It also had to support tamper resistant install and removal since these sensors live in semi-public office spaces and can't be easily walked off with.

Direction

A tall, linear form, with subtle surface articulation that creates a sense of vertical movement. The goal was to pull the device away from networking gear visual cues entirely and toward something more architectural.

Form & Iteration

Form focus was given to the feeling of the undulating surface treatment, making sure that it felt subtle but still impactful. The wall mounting plate doubles as the tabletop base, so the same product reads correctly mounted vertically on a wall or sitting flat on a desk.

CMF

The matte white shell recedes into typical office environments, with the surface articulation doing the visual work instead of color or material contrast.

Engineering & Production

The undulating surfaces had to be meticulously crafted in order to retain their appearance while also being moldable from a single core/cavity mold design.

What Shipped

Launched as the Aruba User Experience Insight sensor into HPE Aruba's enterprise assurance suite.