Stand-by controller assisted failover

A method comprising:

• establishing via a management protocol, by an active access point controller (APC) of an enterprise network, an active control channel and an active data channel with a managed access point (AP) of the enterprise network that is managed by the active APC, wherein management protocol messages relating to control or provisioning of the managed AP are exchanged between the active ACP and the managed AP via the active control channel;
• establishing via the management protocol, by a standby APC of the enterprise network, a standby control channel and a standby data channel with the managed AP;
• providing prompt failure detection of the active APC with reduced consumption of bandwidth between the active APC and the managed AP by keep-alive messages by:
• monitoring, by the managed AP, a health status of the active APC by periodically transmitting a long-interval keep-alive message to the active APC at a frequency of once every X seconds and tracking a first time for response thereto, if any;
• and
• monitoring, by the standby APC, the health status of the active APC by periodically transmitting a short-interval keep-alive message to the active APC at a frequency of once every Y seconds, where Y is less than X and tracking a second time for response thereto, if any, wherein transmission of the short-interval keep-alive message does not consume any bandwidth of the active data channel or the active control channel between the active APC and the managed AP;
• and
• when the health status is indicative of a failure of the active APC, then initiating failover from the active APC to the standby APC by causing the managed AP to direct subsequent management protocol messages to the standby APC via the standby control channel.