Femtocell market update for week of 23 November 2009

SFR ‘Home 3G’ goes live (website ¦ user guide)
SFR launched its Home 3G femtocell this week.  Like the Vodafone Access Gateway, it’s a standalone femtocell offering improved 3G coverage (but, at least initially, no homezone tariffs or femto services).
Some operators have been reluctant to promote an ‘improved coverage’ proposition (which could be interpreted as an [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 17 August 2009

70 million femtocell users of worldwide by 2014
According to a new report from Berg Insight, femtocell shipments will grow from 200,000 in 2009 to 12 million worldwide in 2014, by which time there will be almost six femtocells per macro base station, and 70 million regular femtocell users.  These are impressive statistics, but ZDNet Asia [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 20 July 2009

More experiences with the Vodafone Access Gateway
Here are some observations after my first few days with Vodafone’s new femtocell:

Call quality and data speeds are good.
Hand-out from the femtocell to the macro network works fine, even when driving away.
Hand-in doesn’t work.  However, my calls don’t drop when entering the femtozone and walking right up to [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 4 May 2009

Ericsson holds out on 3G femtocells
Ericsson SVP and head of business unit networks Johan Wibergh said this week, “we still don’t understand the business case for 3G femtocells”.  Speaking after a Q&A session at Ericsson’s capital market day event, he told Unstrung that WiFi is the answer to the indoor data problem, and that Ericsson [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 9 Feb 2009

Femto Forum study finds positive femto business cases – lots of them!
We’ve seen a lot of negative opinion bandied about on the subject of the femtocell business case, and a number of partial reposts.  But a new study from Signals Research Group, commissioned by the Femto Forum, aims to put the issue to bed once [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 2 Feb 2009

TDC to deploy femtocells in Denmark
TDC Mobile says it is working with NEC towards the potential roll-out of femtocells in Denmark in late 2009. The company is currently conducting a trial with “several femtocell access points”. Flemming Hynkemejer, CTO of TDC Mobile says, “Femtocell technology promises to provide our customers with a number of [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 19 Jan 2009

Verizon launches “Wireless Network Extender” femtocell
(Website ¦ FAQ ¦ User manual)
As predicted by Engadget, Verizon has begun selling its femtocell in stores and online.  It uses the same system as Sprint’s AIRAVE, based on the Samsung UbiCell.  Here are the highlights:

Voice and CDMA 1X data only (no EV-DO)
Up to [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 8 December 2008

AT&T excited about Q209 femtocell launch
John Stankey, president and CEO of AT&T’s operations, said AT&T is validating femtocell technology now with customers and employees.  ”We expect that we will be into a broader-scale metropolitan deployment the second quarter of next year,” Stankey said. “We are really excited about this…I don’t know how you compete in [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 13 October 2008

Telefónica O2 prepares new femto trial
Unstrung says that Telefónica O2 Europe is planning a new femtocell consumer trial early next year, and implies that new vendors may be involved.  The article doesn’t say where the trial will be, but it mentions a previously announced UK trial involving NEC and Ubiquisys.  Telefónica O2 has also been [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 6 October 2008

Verizon CTO talks about femtocell plans
Mark Wegleitner revealed some of Verizon’s thinking on femtocells in a recent interview with Telephony Online…
“On femtocells and dual-mode phones: We’re planning for trial of femtocells. Both had obstacles. In one case, the femtocell cost was a problem. In other case, the availability of dual-mode phones was a problem. Both [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 22 September 2008

Japan’s SoftBank getting ready to launch 3G femtocells
The big announcement at the “Femtocells Asia 2008″ conference was SoftBank’s plan to launch 10,000 femtocells in Japan from January 2009, which may turn out to be the first commercial 3G femtocell deployment anywhere in the world.  SoftBank CTO, Junichi Miyakawa, presented details of the technical solution from [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 8 September 2008

Softbank femtocell deployment
Unstrung reports that Softbank Mobile in Japan has installed 20,000 femtocells from NEC / Ubiquisys, and that it is also checking out equipment from Huawei.  But there are, apparently, still some technical and regulatory issues standing in the way of mass market deployment.
Orange goes for 3G UMA
Orange is upgrading its “Unik” dual mode [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 21 July 2008

Chunghwa Telecom to buy 3000 femtocells
Taiwan’s Chunghwa Telecom is reported to have put out a tender for 3000 femtocells.  It’s not huge, but it’s indicative of global interest in femtocells.
Indoor performance is holding back mobile broadband
Excitement about the rapid uptake of mobile broadband (accessing the internet from laptops via HSDPA) has led to predictions that [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 16 June 2008

RadioFrame Slams Kineto Claims
RFN clearly couldn’t stand back and watch Kineto spinning up a victory story in the femtocell standards battle.  Some strong language in this Unstrung interview with RFN’s GM EMEA Mark Keenan (who is also a Femto Forum board member).  This will make the upcoming Femto Forum gathering even more lively than usual.
Dean [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 2 June

Good progress towards femtocell standardisation
The headlines this week give the impression that a new femtocell standard has been agreed.  This is something of an overstatement, but there has been a lot of encouraging progress recently in 3GPP and the Femto Forum, and consensus is now building around a framework for the standard.
For example, it has [...]