Femtocell update for weeks of 29 Dec 2008 & 5 Jan 2009

AT&T recruiting for femtocell consumer trials

It’s reported that AT&T is contacting some of its customers asking if they’d like to test femtocells.  Ars Technica quotes a survey it received from a reader who was contacted: “AT&T’s new product is a small, security-enabled cellular base station that easily connects to your home DSL or Cable Internet, providing a reliable wireless signal for any 3G phone in every room of your house.  The device allows you to have unlimited, nationwide Anytime Minutes for incoming or outgoing calls.”  Unstrung suggests that AT&T may launch its commercial femtocell service in the Fall.

ip.access tops ABI’s picocell vendor matrix

ABI has rated ip.access number 1 in its picocell vendor matrix on both implementation and innovation rankings.  According to Aditya Kaul, senior analyst at ABI Research, “the market for picocells is expected to continue growing at a steady pace, but is dependent on how leading picocell vendors like ip.access adapt and innovate next generation picocells.”  The ABI study concludes that ip.access is well positioned to do this based on its established Oyster 3G^TM femtocell technology.

Super-femtocells needed for the enterprise

In a separate Research Brief, ABI takes a closer look at the market for next generation picocells (or “super-femtocells”).  According to the research, residential femtocells lack the capacity and enterprise grade features essential for enterprise deployment, creating a need for a device which combines the larger capacity of the picocell with the lower cost and ease of installation of the femtocell (see this ip.access white paper for more details).  The market for these new devices is set to grow from almost zero today to more than 500,000 units in 2013.

Recognition for Motorola’s femto-enabled picture frame

Motorola’s innovative CDMA femtocell picture frame has been selected as a 2009 Consumer Electronics Show Innovations Design and Engineering Award Honoree – oddly enough in the “furniture” product category.  You may remember this was first shown back in September 08.  GigaOM believes the device captures three trends for 2009: (1) femtocells; (2) design; and (3) user generated feedback.  Unstrung says building a femto in a photo frame could enable operators to sell “more than just a box of blinking lights.”

First blog reports on StarHub femtocell

Blogger Paul Mah says his StarHub femtocell is up and running.  “It’s essentially just plug-and-play, though the engineers did a few tests to ensure that the mobile handover happens without a glitch”.

Femto commentator round-up

Unstrung’s Michelle Donegan has compiled an impressively comprehensive “who makes what” report on the femtocell vendor landscape.  Elsewhere, she reports on recent developments in femtocell standards.

Total Telecom maintains its very negative stance on femtocells, giving a straw poll of the opinions of its editorial staff.  Interestingly, a straw poll of ip.access staff came up with quite different views.  The TT poll is anonymous to “avoid a lynching from disgruntled readers with vested interests”.

Fierce Wireless forecasts that “femtocells will finally hit the market” in 2009 (number 5 in its top 10 predictions for the new year), and this article on AT&T’s femtocell plans features at number 4 in Unstrung’s top 10 articles of 2008.  (The Unstrung article also has a video from last year’s CTIA Wireless show, including interviews with Airvana, RadioFrame, AirWalk and Motorola.  It’s interesting to see how the market has moved on quite a bit since then.)

RCR Wireless News says it will be late ‘09 or 2010 before the femtocell market grows.  It quotes Peter Jarich in a Dec 12 Current Analysis report that the technology has been “a spectacular failure on a number of fronts.”  I’m sure Peter won’t mind me redressing the balance a bit by quoting from his Jan 5 report that 2009 “looks to be ripe with [femtocell] launches and service expansions”.

David Chambers gives femtocells a generally positive end-of-year report card, with overall “very good progress and attention to detail”.  He says that femtocells “didn’t meet expectations given by some of the more enthusiastic commentators, but overachieved on many industry expectations” – particularly the development of standards.  His only poor mark is for the business case: “There are still doubts about the overall business value outside the coverage and enterprise,” he says.

Meanwhile, Carl Weinschenk says femtocells will be “front and center” in 2009 as fixed and mobile networks expand into each other.

Consumers want mobile phones in their connected homes

Parks Associates reports that consumers see real value in the ability to transfer a mobile call to a fixed-line phone or to move music and photos among PCs and portable multimedia players.  This bodes well for femtocells in the connected home (see here).

Why WiMAX femtocells?

Fujitsu’s Dean Chang explains the challenges of developing WiMax picocells and femtocells, and points out some key benefits like cheaper rollout of WiMAX networks and simplified maintenance.  Thorsten Claus says Comcast’s interest in WiMax femtocells could be motivated by (1) avoiding Clearwire’s wholesale charges when subscribers are at home, (2) better data speeds at home, and (3) making connected home applications more power-efficient than WiFi.

Are repeaters cheaper than femtocells?

zBoost claims femtocells are expensive, and consumers can solve coverage problems more cheaply with one of its repeaters.  But a multi-user zBoost repeater costs at least $299, which doesn’t look too far off Sprint’s Airave femtocell prices ($99 plus $5 per month).

In other femto news…

• Analog Devices launches the ADF4602-1 transceiver for UMTS femtocells…and explains how turbo-encoders boost efficiency of femtocell DSPs.
• Epitiro is selected by a European operator to assess femtocell backhaul quality.
• 2Wire introduces the GEM Ruby femto expansion module for its home gateways.
• Think Femtocell says e-books could be a femtocell driver…and presents an interview with Ubiquisys’ Will Franks.
• A new RFN white paper looks at the practical challenges of deploying femtocells.
• 3G and 4G wireless blog says marketing is the key to femtocell success.
• Articles on femtocells are at the top of the Mobile Handset DesignLine chart for 2008.

In related news…

• Orange’s latest Digital Media Index shows mobile data usage doubling quarter over quarter.
• Mobile phones to be allowed in English hospitals (a good opportunity for picocells).