Trip Report: Femtocells USA

Entities Mentioned

• Motorola
• Airvana
• Google
• Mobile World Congress
• Simon Saunders
• Femto Forum
• Sanjeev Verma
• Gartner Group

1. By David Nowicki
   
   After a year of femtocell conferences being held almost monthly, and amid a global economic downturn, it was hard to believe there was still something original to be said on the topic--but Femtocells USA did not disappoint.
   
   On day one, providing a framework for the overall conference, Femto Forum chairman Simon Saunders presented some noteworthy highlights from Femto Forum collaboration to date:
   
   

   • Continued significant progress on harmonizing ideas toward a standard
   • A comprehensive study on interference mitigation
   • Plan to exhibit as a group at Mobile World Congress 2009
   • Commissioning of an independent study on the business case for femtocells
   • A desire to study “greater femto” to explore using femtocells outside the home environment
   • An exclusive arrangement with Avren Events to hold 3 and only 3 femtocell events (USA, Europe, Asia) in 2009. Hooray! This will keep each event packed with a fresh perspective and allow all of us in the industry to keep moving the market forward.

   
   As usual, operator presentations were the highlight of the show and included a global perspective with presentations from AT&T, Orange, Taiwan Mobile and Cellular South. Topics such as local breakout, enterprise deployment options and femtocell roaming demonstrated the drivers for femtos go beyond residential coverage concerns. Having said that, it was refreshing to hear the keynote presentation on day 3 from Cellular South. The manager of RF design made the case that the macrocell options alone have been cost prohibitive to achieving widespread indoor coverage and that femtocells are a welcome addition to the deployment arsenal.
   
   Vendors also showed off their typical opposing views on difficult topics. One vendor argued that the enterprise was a perfect place to deploy masses of residential femtos. Another argued that for larger enterprises a picocell is a better alternative. This debate seemed to captivate the audience for much of Day 2. Clearly there is a demand for femtocells both in residential and non-residential environments. Our own Sanjeev Verma presented a view on Femtonomics and showed off a fundamental, no-brainer business case based on principles of coverage, capacity and churn reduction.
   
   On the analyst side, there were impressive talks from Signals Research, Current Analysis and Gartner. Signals wowed the audience with an incredibly detailed deployment analysis, Current Analysis positioned the femtocell well against both picocells and Wi-Fi, and Gartner speculated on the home of the future, including their observations on Motorola’s CDMA femtocell picture frame and Google’s Android.
   
   My favorite session was the “Beyond the Headlights” panel looking at a world with Femtocells in 5 and even 10 years time. Beyond all the expected ideas regarding innovative femtozone applications in the digital home, there were enticing discussions on topics such as  “femtocells everywhere”, mobile femtocells and femtocells embedded in everyday devices like laptops. It is certainly clear that operators, analysts and vendors continue to have big plans for this little box.
   
   Editor’s Note: David Nowicki is Airvana’s vice president of marketing and product management.
   

   Bookmark or Share this article

   
   

   Related Articles

   • The Indoor Frontier
   • also written by David Nowicki
   • The VAG on Oxford Street
   • also written by David Nowicki
   • Fixed and Mobile or Fixed or Mobile?
   • also written by David Nowicki
   • Bringing the Boyle out of the Femto
   • also written by David Nowicki
   • Femtocells take broadband route to provisioning
   • also categorized in Americas

   • Research and Markets: Design Analysis of a Sprint Airave Cdma 1900MHz Femtocell BTS Unit
   • also categorized in Americas
   • Femtocells and 4G: Sorting Out The Different Views
   • also written by David Nowicki
   • Femto-cell needs Macro-explaining
   • also published in Femto Hub Blog
   • NetEvents Portugal 2008 Last week saw yet another successful ...
   • also mentions Gartner Group
   • Qualcomm's British Investment Underscores Europe's Femtocell Strength
   • also mentions Motorola

Login to comment.