A Robust & Flexible Solution For Cambridge Consultants

Grosvenor Technology’s access control system secures Cambridge Consultants’ world-class innovation and product development centre. Working from their laboratories in Cambridge, UK, and Boston, USA, they take innovative ideas from conception to production.

All administration, system configuration and diagnostic tasks can be achieved from the convenience of a preferred web browser. The solution is a feature-rich system that encompasses advanced access levels, identity card printing, alarm management, and navigable graphic maps. These features, combined with comprehensive reporting tools, mean that access authorisation and monitoring can take place in real time, across the facility.

Grosvenor’s support and service ensured that they were the de-facto option when specifying a new access control system for the sister site in Boston.

Full integration with third-party systems such as lift controls and fire alarms ensures the building is safely sealed in the event of a fire, only allowing fire marshals with their own access rights back inside until the building is deemed safe to enter. Another example of this versatility is its ability to integrate with existing CCTV. This allows events captured by a third-party CCTV system to be streamed live via any internet browser on both sides of the Atlantic.

Grosvenor’s Site Service Engineers took a collaborative approach, utilising existing wiring and infrastructure to minimise disruption and cost. Meanwhile, the modular nature of the hardware specified for the project enabled over 100 doors to be upgraded quickly, including satellite buildings miles away from the main site.

This is suitable for organisations of any size, from one site to multiple sites across wide area networks. Its architecture is IP-network based, including support for Power over Ethernet (PoE), which allows true scalability and can significantly reduce installation costs. With a Microsoft SQL database at the back end, it will meet all the security and resilience requirements of a modern corporate IT infrastructure.

Alan Wiltshire, Contracts Director for Cambridge Consultants, was a key decision-maker regarding the upgrade of their existing system.

“Due to the diversity of the development we carry out, we needed a system that was robust, yet flexible enough for our particular requirements. Our laboratories are occupied by project teams working on both short and long-term assignments. This means we needed an access control system that could assign privileges to teams and their defined areas for a predetermined duration before resetting and reassigning access rights once the project concluded. Grosvenor’s solution handles requests of this nature with ease.”