Enterprise Warehouse Network Overhaul: Fortinet Infrastructure Deployment

Results at a glance: 100% wireless coverage across the warehouse floor · 10Gbps backbone (upgraded from 1G) · 100+ active users supported.

Project Overview

For this large-scale manufacturing warehouse in North Jersey, we delivered a full Fortinet network infrastructure overhaul across a complex, high-density facility environment:

• FortiGate Firewall Configuration: Deployed and configured FortiGate firewalls with custom firewall access policies, VLAN segmentation, and user access provisioning, replacing legacy configurations and removing unnecessary rules to harden the network perimeter.

• Fortinet Switching Infrastructure: Factory reset and reconfigured all 28 FortiSwitches, successfully adopting 25 switches in the initial phase with full adoption completed in the final rollout. Resolved DAC cable speed inconsistencies impacting inter-switch performance.

• Enterprise Wi-Fi Deployment: Deployed and adopted 43 FortiAPs across the warehouse floor, achieving full wireless coverage for 100+ users. Updated SSIDs, access policies, and added dedicated VLANs for printer traffic to isolate and optimize device communication.

• 10G Backbone Upgrade: Upgraded backbone connectivity from 1G to 10G between core switches, delivering a significant throughput increase to support the facility's high-density operational demands.

• Network Segmentation & Documentation: Created structured VLANs for user traffic, printer traffic, and management access. Produced full network diagrams and conducted an introductory architecture review with facility stakeholders prior to deployment.

Key Challenges

• Scale & Density: Coordinating the adoption of 43 APs and 28 switches across a large warehouse floor required precise staging, sequencing, and on-site troubleshooting to avoid cascading failures during deployment.

• Legacy Configuration Cleanup: The existing FortiGate contained outdated and conflicting configurations that needed to be identified, stripped, and rebuilt cleanly before new policies could be applied safely.

• NTP & DAC Cable Issues: Identified and resolved NTP synchronization failures affecting switch stability, and diagnosed DAC cable speed mismatches causing throughput bottlenecks between backbone switches.

• Zero-Disruption Requirement: All switching, AP adoption, and firewall changes were sequenced to maintain operational continuity throughout the active warehouse environment with no disruption to daily operations.

Results

• Full Facility Coverage: 43 FortiAPs deployed with 100% wireless coverage across the warehouse floor, supporting 100+ active users simultaneously.

• 10x Backbone Speed Increase: Core backbone upgraded from 1G to 10G, eliminating throughput bottlenecks and future-proofing the infrastructure for operational growth.

• Reduced Downtime: Proactive VLAN segmentation and firewall policy hardening significantly reduced network-related incidents and unplanned downtime across the facility.

• Clean, Documented Infrastructure: Full network diagrams and structured configurations delivered to the client, enabling faster troubleshooting and easier future expansion.

Why Fortinet Here, and Not Ubiquiti

Worth being direct about this, because most of our client networks are built on Ubiquiti UniFi, where there is no annual license fee and the client owns the hardware outright.

This site was already a Fortinet environment. The FortiGates and FortiSwitches were in place, the client had invested in them, and the problem was not the platform. It was years of accumulated configuration nobody had cleaned up. Ripping out working hardware to replace it with a different brand would have been an expensive way to solve a problem that did not exist.

The platform follows the requirement. That is the whole principle, and it cuts both ways: we will tell you when UniFi is the right answer, and we will tell you when it is not.

Get Started

This is enterprise networking work: network design, switching, wireless, and firewalls for facilities that have outgrown what they were originally built for. Ongoing monitoring of what we build can sit inside a managed IT agreement, and the wider picture of what we handle for manufacturers, on the floor and in the office, is set out here.

Has your facility outgrown its network? Tell us what you are running.