By When your infrastructure crosses the Atlantic for seven days with no physical access, no fallback to a local data center, and 5,000 guests depending on the network, standard enterprise IT practices are not enough. Every configuration change, firmware upgrade, and new technology deployment carries direct risk to guest services and life-safety systems with no ability to dispatch an engineer mid-ocean. The tolerance for failure is effectively zero.
In this interview on TFiR, Diogo Almeida, Head of Network, Connectivity & Infrastructure at AIDA Cruises, walks through how the company architects, tests, and operates a fully resilient Cisco-based network across an eleven-ship fleet, covering everything from lab-based pre-deployment methodology to BLE-integrated safety systems and the AI roadmap now in proof-of-concept.
Guest: Diogo Almeida, Head of Network, Connectivity & Infrastructure at AIDA Cruises
Show: TFiR
Here is what every network infrastructure engineer and enterprise IT architect managing remote or distributed operations needs to know.
Technical Deep Dive
Q: What does the IT infrastructure of a cruise ship actually look like at an operational scale?
Diogo Almeida, Head of Network, Connectivity & Infrastructure at AIDA Cruises, describes each ship as a moving city with a hospital, laundry, coffee shops, a supermarket, a theater, and excursion services, all dependent on the same network and server backbone. AIDA operates eleven ships and transports approximately 1.5 million guests per year. The entire network core, distribution layer, and access points are built on Cisco, with the fleet now transitioning server and compute infrastructure to Cisco UCS.
“They are 11 cities, moving cities, and the network and server infrastructure that I manage make all of this connect together and work.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: Why is managing IT on a cruise ship fundamentally different from managing a land-based enterprise?
The core constraint is physical inaccessibility combined with extremely limited bandwidth. When a ship is crossing the Atlantic, the transit takes seven days and there is no way to dispatch an engineer on board. Almeida notes the available Internet bandwidth to the ships is very small compared to what a land-based office would expect, meaning the infrastructure must be self-sufficient and failure-resistant for the entire duration. Any incident during transit directly affects guest and crew experience with no rapid remediation path.
“We don’t have the same Internet connection that we have at home. We have a very, very small bandwidth to access the ships.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does AIDA Cruises test and validate new network technology before deploying it to a live ship?
Two and a half years ago AIDA built a full-scale replica of a ship’s data center at their headquarters in Rostock, Germany. The lab, referred to internally as AIDA Cube, mirrors the exact two-data-center layout used on the ships, with the same device types, software versions, and quantities, minus the full access point count. The team uses it for pre-deployment validation, upgrade testing, and early-stage technology trials. Almeida confirmed that Cisco has used the lab to test technologies that had not yet been publicly announced.
“We create a lab in our headquarters in Rostock. It is the complete copy of a ship.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does network segmentation work on a cruise ship where guest traffic and life-safety systems share the same infrastructure?
Almeida describes the approach as treating guest systems and safety systems with equal priority, enforced through network segmentation that distributes traffic and ensures neither workload can crowd out the other. The segmentation allows guest-facing services such as streaming, Wi-Fi, and onboard retail to coexist with fire suppression triggers, medical alarms, and evacuation systems on the same physical infrastructure. Priority is assigned by system type, not by commercial value of the traffic.
“We treat a security system with the same priority as a guest system.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does Cisco infrastructure integrate with shipboard emergency and life-safety systems?
AIDA uses Cisco Webex and Cisco Unified Communications Manager so that when a medical or fire emergency occurs on the ship, a designated group of crew members immediately receives a continuous vibrating and audio alarm on their phones indicating the type and precise location of the incident. The system removes the manual overhead of radio communication or PA announcements and routes the alert directly to the relevant response team. Almeida describes this as one of the more direct integrations between the Cisco network layer and operational safety outcomes.
“Immediately a group of crew members receive a non-stop vibrating and sound alarm on their phone with what is the incident and where it is located.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does AIDA use BLE tracking and Cisco Spaces to make CO2 fire suppression safer for crew?
AIDA, working with Cisco and a partner called Polestar, implemented a BLE tag-based crew location system in engine room areas where CO2 can be deployed to suppress fire. Previously, confirming the area was clear of personnel required a manual card-based process. The current system uses Cisco Spaces and BLE tags worn by crew to display real-time location down to the square meter on a dashboard. Operators can confirm the area is clear before deploying CO2, and the same BLE tag includes a manual alarm button crew can press if they need assistance.
“With Cisco Spaces and BLE tags we can locate them, even the square meter where they are on those engine areas.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does AIDA use IoT and location services to improve response time for medical emergencies involving AED devices?
AED defibrillators on board are now monitored through the location services layer. When a device is removed from its wall mount, the system immediately triggers a location-tagged alert to the medical department, specifying which device was removed and the area of the ship it is being carried toward. Previously the process was a manual phone call to medical with no location data. The change allows the medical team to respond to the correct location faster rather than searching the ship.
“If that AED device is removed from the wall, it is immediately located and an alarm goes to the medical department saying this one was removed and is going to this area of the ship.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: What is open roaming and why did AIDA Cruises prioritize it as an infrastructure investment?
Open roaming, implemented in partnership with Cisco and the Wireless Broadband Alliance, allows guests who have the AIDA app to automatically connect to the ship’s network when they arrive at the terminal during check-in, without manually selecting an SSID or entering credentials. AIDA was the first brand in the cruise industry to implement open roaming across its full fleet. The practical effect is that guest check-in queues previously caused by network onboarding have been eliminated, and guests also automatically connect to over 4.5 million open roaming access points globally at train stations, airports, and shopping malls.
“Now with our AIDA app, it doesn’t matter if you go to one of our shore sites and offices or to any of our ships. If you have the AIDA app you just get close to the ship and you are already connected to the Internet.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: What is the scale of the AIDA fleet network in terms of devices and access points under management?
Almeida describes the fleet as running approximately 64,000 access points and 15,000 access switches across all ships. All of these devices require proactive 24×7 monitoring to ensure guests can make calls to family, stream content, and access onboard services, while simultaneously supporting backstage systems such as stage machinery and lighting in the theater. The scale makes manual incident response impractical and drives the team’s investment in automated and AI-assisted monitoring tools.
“We are talking about 64,000 access points, 15,000 access switches, and all of that needs to work.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How is the IT support team structured across ships and shore for a fleet of this size?
Ship-side staffing varies by vessel class. The smallest Sphinx class ships carry two people, an IT Officer and an IT Admin. Hyperion class ships carry four, an IT Officer, an IT Admin, and two IT Technicians. The largest Excel class ships carry five, an IT Officer, two IT Admins, and two IT Technicians. All ship-side staff handle Level 1 support. Shore side, a team of approximately 25 engineers covering network and server disciplines provides higher-level support, backed by a 24×7 partner for Level 2 and Level 3 escalations. A separate architecture team works with Cisco on dry dock planning and upgrade paths.
“It is a team that works like a family with very specific technology knowledge.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: How does AIDA handle incident diagnosis when a guest reports a problem that cannot be reproduced or located?
Guest-reported incidents on ships are difficult to trace because the guest moves on once they report an issue and cannot reliably be located again. Almeida describes the team’s approach as reverse engineering the incident, using monitoring data, guest satisfaction forms, and system logs to reconstruct what the guest was experiencing and identify the root cause or improvement opportunity. The open roaming deployment was itself partly driven by feedback from satisfaction forms identifying connectivity friction on turnaround days as a consistent complaint.
“We need to try to reverse engineer the incident to understand or try to find out what that guest was experiencing and see how we can improve or solve the incident.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: What is the AI roadmap for AIDA Cruises infrastructure and guest experience?
Almeida outlines two parallel AI tracks currently in proof-of-concept at AIDA Cube. The first is proactive infrastructure monitoring using AI to identify failure conditions before they become outages, shifting the team from reactive to predictive operations. The second is a guest-facing application combining location-based services with CCTV feeds and AI analysis to show guests real-time occupancy data for restaurants, pool decks, and common areas, paired with in-app wayfinding. Almeida identified Cisco IQ and Cisco Canvas AI with Meraki cameras as the specific tools being evaluated to advance both tracks.
“I want to use AI for proactive monitoring. You are going to have a problem here, so please act before this becomes an outage.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Q: What role did Cisco CX Services play in the AIDA infrastructure transformation?
Over the past three and a half years AIDA conducted a full replacement of its network and server infrastructure across the fleet. Almeida states that Cisco CX Services were a fundamental part of this program, involved in solution design and present on-site during every dry dock implementation. He described their involvement as being there every step of the way throughout the program, and said the scale of the transformation would not have been possible without that services engagement.
“All these new tools we put inside were not possible without the CX services. They were a fundamental part on our surveys design and even on the dry dock implementations.” — Diogo Almeida, Head of Network Infrastructure and Connectivity, AIDA Cruises
Resources & Documentation
- AIDA Cruises, German cruise brand of Carnival Corporation, operator of eleven ships discussed in this interview
- Cisco Catalyst Center, network management and automation platform used across the AIDA fleet
- Cisco ThousandEyes, network intelligence platform referenced for fleet visibility
- Cisco Spaces, location services platform used for BLE crew tracking and safety workflows
- Cisco Meraki, camera and networking platform being evaluated for AI-based occupancy and guest experience
- Cisco Unified Communications Manager, call manager platform integrated with shipboard emergency alerting
- Cisco UCS, unified computing platform being adopted for server infrastructure across the fleet
- Wireless Broadband Alliance OpenRoaming, standard and global network behind the seamless guest Wi-Fi connectivity rollout at AIDA
- Cisco CX Services, advisory and implementation services cited as central to the three-and-a-half-year infrastructure transformation
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👇 Click to Read Full Raw Transcript
Swapnil Bhartiya: Hi, this is Swapnil Bhartiya and we are here at Cisco Live and today we have with us Diogo Almeida, Head of Network, Connectivity & Infrastructure at AIDA Cruises. First of all, Diogo, it’s great to have you on the show.
Diogo Almeida: Oh, thank you very much and thank you for having me here with you.
Swapnil Bhartiya: It’s my pleasure. First of all, of course we are here at the event. I also learned that your flight got delayed, so you’re a bit exhausted. You may not have seen the show floor, but if you see from here, it looks like a very exciting event. Talk a bit about your presence at this event.
Diogo Almeida: I don’t know. I came the last 15 years to Cisco live in MA and NUS. I thought that was a little bit less crowded today, but I arrived around 8 in the morning. So on that time was less crowded, but now I see a lot of people around. I will take also the time today and tomorrow to go around, visit some friends, some partners and to wander a little bit around.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Perfect. Awesome. And we look, I mean most of us, we love cruisers. It’s more like mini city, floating in the ocean, middle of ocean. But you have to maintain all that infrastructure, all the networking, all the connectivity. So can you talk about from the IT infrastructure perspective, for those who may not know what are some of the. I’m not talking about general it, but some of the. Especially in this era where AI is of course big, security is getting big. You know, what are some of the technologies that you are working on with Cisco?
Diogo Almeida: I can present very shortly. Aida. So Aida Cruises is the German brand of the Carnival Cruise Line. We transport around 1.5 million guests per year. And what we want to give to those guests are unforgettable moments that they enjoy their holidays. For that there is a full backbone of IT network, server infrastructure and connectivity that make the ship operate. Like you said, they are 11 cities, moving cities. And we have on our ships exactly as maybe your city or a smaller town. Hospital, laundry, coffee shops, supermarket, theater, short excursions, bicycles. So everything is there. And the network and the server infrastructure that I manage make all of this connect together and work. It’s not a easy environment to maintain. We know that IT infrastructure and with all the new technologies, AI and all the need of cyber security is already hard to maintain. But now you need to imagine it in a floating city that can be in the other side of the world with very small connectivity bandwidth. So we don’t have the same Internet connection that we have at home. We have a very, very small bandwidth to access the ships. For that our infrastructure needs to have a very high resilience to ensure that we don’t have incidents when the ship is crossing, let’s say the Atlantic. It goes seven days crossing the Atlantic and there is no way for someone to go on the ship. So before departing or when it arrives to the other side of the ocean. So we need to ensure that all of our devices, our configurations and whatever tools we use are always ready to work without failure. What we use on the ships and aid has a strong partnership with Cisco. So all of our network core distribution, the access points, everything is Cisco. So we have all the network backbone on Cisco. We are upgrading our server computing infrastructure also to Cisco ucs and besides that we leverage the Cisco IQ thousandeyes Catalyst Center, Cisco Spaces openroaming We were the first brand implementing open roaming on the cruise industry. And is this that we that we have how this help us? Open roaming as an example, you go to a new place, you go to a cruise ship, you needed to open your phone, go on settings, select the wireless lan, select the name the SSID and connect. And now with our IDA app, doesn’t matter if you go to one of our shore sites and offices or to any of our ships, if you have the IDA app you just get close to the ship and even in the terminal where you are doing the check in, you are already connected to the Internet. So all these new technologies that we are implementing are enhancing the satisfaction of our guests.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Now there is one difference I think and I may be totally wrong, but I’m not in the cruise industry. Just like. And you can correct me if I’m wrong. Like just like airplanes, you know, you have to keep flying. So the ships, you know, they don’t just talk for, you know, you cannot do a lot of testing everything when the ship is in the ocean, you know. So I think you folks have also been something ADA Cube, something like that. So at kind of twin replicator. So talk a bit about because you have to when you implement deploy new technology you cannot just staying in the production. So talk about that aspect.
Diogo Almeida: Our ships operate 24 by 7 and 365 days per year non stop. Is always risky to upgrade the device or deploy a new technology or a new configuration with the ship operating. If something goes wrong or we hit a bug or some technology challenge or difficulty, we are immediately interfering with the guests and crew satisfaction. For that two and a half years ago we create a lab in our headquarters in Rostock is the complete copy of a ship. So in terms of data center. We have exactly two data centers as we operate on the ships. One distribution room, Same type of devices, same version, same quantity. What we don’t have is 5,000 access points, but probably we have 20 or 30. And we use that lab to test new technologies to make a pre deployment before taking to the ships. And also to upgrade the existing environments. We partnered very close with Cisco. Cisco already used our lab for technologies that were not even yet announced to the public. So we help them with some technologies and we are still working on that. I just came from a meeting that I cannot say what it was. But we decided that pre presenting that new technology. We will work together on cube to test it and help to improve it.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Now there are one more thing is that you folks have like of course a lot of infotainment system that customers use. But then you have your own admission critical also safety, security, safety of the ship, fire monitoring, you know, evacuation. So those systems should not collide or collapse with each other. Customer system should not overwhelm those systems. So how do you also if you can whatever you can share what kind systems are there and what role? Because customer facing are low prior. I mean, they are priority. But a customer watching a movie is not as important as the safety of the ship. So talk about that aspect.
Diogo Almeida: So for us the the safety systems, of course they are the most relevant part of our journey with the ship. But also our guest satisfaction. So we treat a security system with the same priority as a guest system. For that we have network segmentation to ensure that the priorities are distributed equally for our guest and crew satisfaction and for our security. I can give some examples of how the security interacts with it and our Cisco environment. We have a simple system. If there is a medical or a fire emergency on the ship via the Cisco’s harbor and the call manager. Immediately a group of crew members receive a non stop vibrating and sound alarm on their phone with what is the incident and where is located. We also have developed with Cisco and a company called Polestar that is a Cisco partner the CO2 mastering. So in the ship you have areas where in case of fire we can deploy CO2. But to do that we need to ensure that no crew member is inside. Until now was a manual process with a card. We know that someone is there. Let’s wait for him to come out. In this moment. And with Cisco Spices and BLE Tax we can locate them even the square meter where they are on those engine areas we have a dashboard and we can see we sound the alarm. They came out we don’t see anyone on the areas we can deploy the CO2. The same ble tag also has an alarm with a button that if they need help they can click and an alarm sounds. On our dashboard we are developing more systems with Cisco and improving the location based services to increase the security. Another example that we have now, the AED devices in case someone needs the defibrillator was removed from the wall. Someone we called the medical department and that was the process in this moment. If that AED device is removed from the wall is immediately located and alarm goes to the medical department say hey, this one was removed from the wall is going to this area of the ship so they can react faster and to the correct location where the device is being used.
Swapnil Bhartiya: I mean so almost everything on the ship has some kind of sensor. So everything you touch is moved. Which also kind of. We have done cruises and a lot of people who go, they always complain about, you know, the, the cost of that is high. They also talk about but they don’t appreciate because think about it, you’re off. You, you have built a kind of IT infrastructure in the middle of nowhere with no connectivity, which is at aspect most people do. I would love for you if you can just talk a bit about the challenges that and how you still maintain that. So people who don’t appreciate start appreciating that. So next time men go to cruise, they don’t because we don’t realize it right.
Diogo Almeida: There are very big teams behind working 24 by 7 to ensure a proactive monitoring of every single device. And when we talk about every single device we are talking about 64,000 access points, 15,000 access switches. And all of that needs to work so they can call their families, they can see the pictures that were taken during the day, they can change a channel and see their favorite program. They go to the theater and the stage needs to come up and down, the lights need to work. All the effect and all of this is connected with the infrastructure. The teams are very big working. As I said 24 by 7 we have external partners also monitoring and supporting us. But yes is a challenge maintaining the ships when they are so far away. It’s different from a company that you can go, you go inside the data center, you talk with every single user there. We don’t have it. We have a guest that complains that the Internet is not working and the time that takes from him to go to the reception and say hey, I need help. And if the reception cannot help immediately the guest went to the Restaurant to the spa, we cannot locate that guest again. So we need to try to reverse engineering the incident to understand or try to find out what that guest was experienced experiencing and see how we can improve or solve solve the incident. We have a lot of satisfaction forms for the guests. We analyze them to check where can we be better. And the open roaming is one of the examples. Was very hard on the turn over day. So when all the guests that finish the cruise go out and the new 5,000 come inside, there were lines and lines on the reception and other locations where we put a crew to help just for them to connect to the network. And now with open roaming they are immediately connected. Is already very, very good for them and they notice these small things and these improvements, but they don’t understand what is behind and all the work technology investment, the risk that sometimes we take to go with a new technology and make it work and help Cisco to develop it further. But in the end it’s very satisfactory for us to see our guests using the technology and that they are having unforgettable moments during the holidays.
Swapnil Bhartiya: And I think ADA was the first one to deploy open roaming as well. If I’m not.
Diogo Almeida: Yes. So was a joint venture with Cisco and the Wireless Broadband Alliance. They gave us a huge support to implement and roll out open roaming. It’s fully working in every ship. We add now a new function with the Wireless Broadband Alliance. We give to our guests 4.5 million free access points around the world that they also connect via open roaming. Some train stations, shopping malls, airports. And that made a huge difference on how our guests start their holidays. Because if you start your holidays, you are, I don’t know, 15, 20 minutes for check in and then you need to be more 20, 30 minutes to connect to the Internet. You start already your holidays not on the correct way. So our goal is that the guest will get to the terminal while he’s doing the check in, is already connected to the Internet. He can start booking a restaurant, a Spark package, an excursion and he doesn’t have to worry about anything else. He goes out of the ship, goes in a short excursion, goes to see a city, comes back, he’s connected again. And when he goes to a new ship, a new cruise in a different ship, it will be already connected also.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Yeah. And how much of the maintenance team is on board on a ship versus land based.
Diogo Almeida: So on ship side we have three classes of ships. The smallest one, Sphinx class that we have seven ships, we have two, it’s IT Officer and IT Admin. There to make the level one support. Then on the Hyperion class we have one IT officer, one IT admin and two IT technicians. We have two ships of those and the biggest ones, the Excel class, we have five it’s one IT officer, two IT admins and two IT technicians. They do the level one. Then on short side they have a team of 25 engineers between network and server and we are supported by a partner on the 24×7 for level two and level three. Then we have architecture team that together with Cisco designs the new implementations every time the ship goes to a dry dock, what type of technology we’ll use, which upgrade path we’ll take. But it’s not a very big team for the number of ships we have. But it’s a team that works like a family with very specific technology knowledge. We have dedicated persons for IFI and security, for routing and switching, for Windows, for Linux, for virtualization. So it’s a very technical team that in the end supports all of this.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Before we wrap this up, ADA has also been looked at as kind of a modern model for maritime IT infrastructure. But technologies are changing. AI is coming in now, satellite Internet, you know, with Starlink that is getting better. What kind of. If you look at the next generation or evolution from your perspective of it, where customers can even get more access to more IT technology, what would be
Diogo Almeida: that I think in the next years and what we are focused on at least under infrastructure is to use AI for proactive monitoring. So I can say hey, you are going to have a problem here so please act before this becomes an outage. So we want to use AI for proactive monitoring and maintenance. And I think the goal will be leveraging the location based services with the CCTV of the ship and putting AI on top of where he can help us identify which restaurant is free. How is the theater if it’s too full? If I go out of my cabin, I’m a first timer on a cruise, I want to have my breakfast. I see four restaurants. Two are red, one is yellow and one is green. Oh, this one is the one I want to go because it’s green. I will have a place to sit. I don’t know where it is but I click and I have a way finding on on the ship the same. If I want to go to one of the pool decks I can see in which area are more free sunbeds. I think that will be the future. We are making some POCs on that but nothing to deploy yet. So it’s still on idcube side to see where we are going to leverage more AI. Cisco presented us and we are using the Cisco, the Cisco IQ and now today the canvas AI with the Meraki because we have some Meraki cameras on the ships and I think is what I’m going to take from from this Cisco live is those two to work on that with Cisco and try to deploy new things for our guests.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Excellent. I think now I have most of what I wanted to understand anything else that you feel like because this is off camera question. That’s okay. This is critical for the work that we do here and I would like to talk about or you feel that we have talked about.
Diogo Almeida: I think we talk about almost everything that is one I want to highlight that is the Cisco CX services what we did in the last three years and a half that we completely changed the network and server infrastructure of Aida and all these new tools we put inside were not possible without the CX services. So they were a fundamental part on our surveys design and even on the dry dock implementations. They were there with us every step of the way.
Swapnil Bhartiya: Yoga, thank you so much for joining me and share not only your journey but the journey that people take with Ada Cruise. Thanks for all those great insights and I would love to chat with you folks again. Thank you.
