Sprint’s Palm Pre Should Accelerate Femtocell Demand

Entities Mentioned

• Sprint
• Airvana
• Dan Hesse
• Bloomberg
• Amit Jain

1. 

   By Amit Jain
   
   On June 6th, Sprint launched the Palm Pre. Sprint CEO Dan Hesse called it Sprint’s “coming out party”.  He could not have been more correct.  There were lines at Sprint stores across the country and the initial quantities were sold out within hours.  Neither Sprint nor Palm has disclosed sales figures, but Bloomberg estimates that 150,000 phones were sold in two days. The Pre continues to get great reviews, and even though there is disagreement on whether Pre is the an “iPhone killer”, it did force Apple to reduce the price of its iPhone 3G phone by 50% and announce a new iPhone.  All in all, a great “coming out party” for Sprint.
   

   With the launches of the iPhone, Pre and perhaps to a lesser extent the BlackBerry Storm, a pattern is emerging by which a new device has such a strong and immediate impact as to transform the operator’s brand, and drive tectonic shifts in user behavior and expectations. Data from operators who launched the iPhone show that data usage quadruples once customers start using the web on their smartphone. And users who acquire these coveted devices will expect them to perform well. 
   

   In this respect, the Pre is sure to benefit from the strides Sprint has made in improving the quality of its network.  After years of lagging in quality surveys conducted by J.D. Powers and associates, in April 2009, Sprint tied with Verizon for highest call quality in the Western US, and improved its ranking in three other regions. As part of efforts to improve its network, last August, Sprint became the first operator in the world to commercially launch femtocells. Since then, Sprint’s Airave offering has been available in retail outlets across the US and through Sprint’s enterprise sales channel, and today Sprint announced it will extend its Airave offer through its wholesale distribution channels.
   

   Of course, Sprint’s Airave improves voice coverage, but it does not currently support 3G EV-DO – the high speed data technology that makes smartphones like Pre shine.  Soon however, 3G femtocells will be ready for the market, and these will form a natural complement to smart phones. 3G femtocells will help operators deliver great data performance for Pre’s, iPhones and Storms inside homes and offices, while offloading macrocellular networks and adding mobile broadband capacity.
   
   Editor's Note: Amit Jain is vice president of business development for Airvana.
   
   
   
   
   

   Bookmark or Share this article

   
   

   Related Articles

   • Femto Forum Embraces xDSL Management Scheme
   • also categorized in Americas
   • Hit A Femto Home Run: Serve Your Customers, Protect Your Network
   • also categorized in Americas
   • AlcaLu Teams for 3G CDMA Femtocells
   • also mentions Amit Jain
   • Kineto finds new FMC bright spots
   • also categorized in Americas
   • Femto Forum agrees on management protocol
   • also categorized in Americas

   • 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
   • Hitachi Com, Airvana Partner for CDMA Femtocell Solutions
   • also mentions Airvana
   • Femto-cell needs Macro-explaining
   • also published in Femto Hub Blog
   • Research and Markets: Design Analysis of a Sprint Airave Cdma ...
   • also categorized in Americas

Login to comment.