The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex stands as one of NASA’s most iconic facilities. Spanning a 42-acre campus in Cape Canaveral, Florida, the complex welcomes millions of visitors annually, offering historic rocket launches, interactive exhibits, and immersive experiences that celebrate space exploration’s past, present, and future. Behind the scenes, a dedicated team ensures every visitor’s experience is extraordinary, relying heavily on seamless collaboration and communication.
Pedro Oñoro, IT Director at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, leads the charge in equipping teams with the tools they need to succeed. Recognizing that teamwork is as mission critical as the rockets themselves, Oñoro has driven the adoption of Webex and Cisco collaboration devices to connect employees across executive offices, operations, security, and mission support environments.
Delaware North operates the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex as a NASA contractor. As a NASA contractor, we take great pride in operating the visitor complex providing hospitality services for Kennedy Space Center.
The Challenge
The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex welcomes over 1.6 million visitors each year, seeing a dramatic increase especially since the 2013 opening of the Space Shuttle Atlantis display. To accommodate this growth, the visitor complex embarked on a development project including a new 50,000-square-foot administration building for its executive team. This presented an opportunity to modernize communication infrastructure, replacing a public branch exchange (PBX) system with an agile, cloud-based calling solution.
Oñoro explained, “When we had a problem with a phone line, we had to go in person to fix it, and it was a very complex issue to resolve that took a lot of time. Now, it’s extremely easy to troubleshoot and fix.” The visitor complex also needed to improve communication and collaboration among in-office and remote workers, ensuring a consistent, high-quality experience across multiple teams and locations.
The Solution
Familiar with Cisco’s technology from prior deployments of Wi-Fi devices and network switches, Kennedy Space Center chose Webex Calling, a cloud-based Voice over IP (VoIP) system that enables easy deployment across multiple locations without physical installation. Oñoro noted, “We chose Webex Calling because using a Voice over IP (VoIP) system will enable us to deploy it easily in multiple locations.”
Webex’s superior audio quality, minimizing jitter and packet loss, was a key factor. The Webex Control Hub management portal allows real-time troubleshooting and centralized management of users, devices, and services from a single platform. Oñoro shared, “Control Hub is a very powerful tool that enables us to manage all our users, collaboration devices, and services from one platform.”
The visitor complex incorporated several Cisco collaboration devices into the new building, including:
- Cisco Desk Mini: Portable collaboration devices for executives to join hybrid meetings and access web apps easily.
- Cisco Board Pro: All-in-one tools for conferencing, teamwork, whiteboarding, web apps and content sharing.
- Cisco Room Kit EQ: Video conferencing systems with AI-powered features like background noise removal.
- Cisco Room Navigator: Touch controllers for room booking and meeting control.
- Cisco Table and Ceiling Microphone Pro: Ensuring clear audio capture.
- Room Vision PTZ Cameras: Intelligent tracking and high-quality video for dynamic meetings.
Oñoro emphasized, “We chose Cisco Room Kit EQ to enhance communication through cinematic meetings. One of the system’s big features is background noise removal, so it’s a great tool for our employees, remote workers, and guests.”
Deployment & Adoption
The deployment focused on creating a flexible collaboration ecosystem that supports diverse teams, including executive leadership, HR, operations, safety, facilities, and security. Oñoro explained, “Each group has unique communication needs, so we’ve built a flexible collaboration ecosystem using Cisco collaboration devices that ensures everyone can connect clearly, reliably, and securely.”
Standardizing on Cisco collaboration devices has created consistent, high-quality meeting experiences across the campus. The Desk Mini devices empower executives with personal collaboration tools, while Board Pro devices serve as interactive collaboration hubs for strategy sessions and design discussions. Larger conference rooms utilize Room Kit EQ systems for immersive video and audio experiences.
Voice communications are supported by a range of Cisco Phones tailored to different use cases, including models 9851, 9861, and 9871 for administrative offices, DECT 6800 series wireless handsets for operations teams, and rugged Wireless Phone 860 devices for security and operations staff. Headsets such as the Cisco Headset 730 and 720 Series provide noise cancellation and comfort for open offices and contact centers.
Oñoro highlighted the importance of consistency: “The biggest benefit is consistency. Whether someone is in an executive office, a conference room, or out in the field, the experience is seamless. Meetings start on time, audio and video are clear, and collaboration feels natural.”
Results & Impact
The Cisco and Webex ecosystem has transformed collaboration at Kennedy Space Center, enabling teams to stay aligned and focused on their mission-critical work. Oñoro shared that the Visitor Complex averages 50,000 minutes per month on Webex Calling with approximately 200 active users and around 15 conference rooms equipped with Cisco collaboration devices.
Internal communication has improved significantly, with IT and operations teams using Webex Messaging for instant support and collaboration, reducing reliance on traditional ticketing systems. Oñoro noted, “We use Webex Messaging with our internal IT teams to communicate. We started to use Webex with the operations teams, so if they need assistance from IT, they can just message us.”
The deployment of intelligent Webex collaboration tools has also enhanced meeting accessibility and inclusivity through AI-powered features like automated transcripts and closed captions.
Overall, productivity has increased almost 85% with the deployment of new collaboration devices in the conference rooms, meeting spaces, and offices.
Future Plans
Looking ahead, Kennedy Space Center is “…continuing to expand and optimize our use of Cisco and Webex technologies, exploring more intelligent features like automation and additional AI-driven meeting enhancements with Cisco AI Assistant” Oñoro shared.
The visitor complex is also upgrading large conference facilities to enable cinematic meeting experiences with enhanced audio and video quality, creating more immersive collaboration environments for space partners like SpaceX, Blue Origin, and NASA itself.
Oñoro envisions a deepening partnership with Cisco: “The way I see our partnership evolving in the future is by including more of the Webex and Cisco ecosystem into our operations. Kennedy Space Center will continue its relationship with Cisco because we’ve used its line of products in the past, and they’ve been extremely reliable. So why go with another vendor when you already have one you can trust?”
Want to see the same types of benefits in your own organization? Contact our team today to streamline communication and improve your organization’s workflow.
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