Femtocell market update for week of 5 October 2009

AT&T expands 3G MicroCell availability
According to AT&T’s website, the 3G MicroCell is now available in Atlanta (29 stores) and Columbia (3 stores).  This follows last week’s launch in Raleigh (11 stores) and the original market of Charlotte NC (19 stores), making 62 stores in total.  One delighted customer commented, “Holy crap – AT&T 3g Microcell [...]

AT&T launches 3G femtocell in Charlotte N.C.

AT&T tried to start selling its new 3G femtocell quietly via its retail stores in one city this week, releasing details about the device on a new 3G Microcell website.  But despite the low-key launch there was an immediate hailstorm of coverage in the blogosphere / twitterverse and in the mainstream telecoms press.  AT&T’s 3G [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 24 August 2009

Wall Street Journal covers femtocells
A WSJ article this week (full text here) points out that “carriers are reluctant to talk about coverage problems…making femtocells a tough product to market to consumers”.  However, Kevin Packingham, senior VP of product development for Sprint, is quoted as saying “advertising will ramp up with next-generation femtocells since it [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 13 July 2009

Vodafone Access Gateway reviews
The Vodafone Access Gateway made it to the Sunday Times gadget of the week, but Paul Rasmussen at Fierce Wireless believes that Vodafone is “adopting a very quiet marketing strategy to its femtocell deployment”.
Andrew Grill says “the experience of ordering and setting up the femtocell was not perfect”, and he had to [...]

Femtocell market update for weeks of 29 June & 6 July 2009

Following a reprimand this afternoon from Femto Forum chairman Simon Saunders , here’s an attempt to catch up with the last two weeks…
DoCoMo to launch HSPA femtocell later this year
Japanese operator NTT DoCoMo has given its femtocell an upgrade (pic), with plug’n’play provisioning and HSPA for faster data connections.  Interestingly, DoCoMo says the new [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 8 June 2009

Sprint offers its femtocell to MVNO and cable partners
Sprint has announced that it will white-label its AIRAVE femtocell, enabling wholesale partners to offer their own branded CDMA femtocell services.  This includes MVNOs (such as Virgin Mobile USA), as well as wireline and cable operators.
“The femtocell offering is not only a differentiator in the marketplace [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 11 May 2009

There’s not a huge mount of femtocell news this week, but there is quite a lot of news about WiFi, which is seen by many as the main competitor to femtocells for connecting mobile devices to the internet at home.
It’s official – WiFi doesn’t work!
An Ofcom-commissioned report has revealed numerous problems with WiFi performance in [...]

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 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 weeks of 20 & 27 October 2008

AT&T announces 3G femtocell trial
AT&T says it will start femtocell trials later this year.  “As the nation’s leading provider of both wireless and broadband, it makes sense that we would examine the potential benefits of femtocells for our customers,” an AT&T spokeswoman said.  “We’re currently doing testing in our labs and a trial is planned [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 15 September 2008

Users say how Sprint’s Airave could be improved
Airave users commenting on the Engadget site say that Sprint should remove the monthly fee (e.g. “I don’t mind buying the box and maybe even a one time fee for setup, but monthly recurring charges to fix bad signal issues? Hmmm… Nope.”  Others, not understanding the legal constraints, [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 1 September 2008

DoCoMo updates its femtocell offering
Japanese giant NTT DoCoMo said it is planning to use a new version of Mitsubishi’s femtocell for its “Home Area” service.  The new femto supports HSPA with 14.4 Mbps downlink speeds and 5.7 Mbps uplink.  DoCoMo’s original Mitsubishi femtocell has been in use since the autumn of 2007, although without much [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 18 August 2008

ip.access ranks top specialist femto vendor in operator perception survey
More details have been published from Heavy reading’s recent operator perception survey. The operators surveyed ranked their perceptions of femtocell equipment suppliers. Alcatel-Lucent got top marks among the large vendors, while ip.access was the highest ranked among the smaller femto vendors.
Business Week says Airave [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 11 August 2008

Airave  reviews mostly positive
More reviews of the Sprint Airave appeared this week, most being very positive on the technology but not so pleased with the pricing. Here’s a selection of quotes…
Engadget says…

“Here’s what it all boils down to – does this unit really make a noticeable improvement in call quality and signal strength? In [...]

Femtocell market update for week of 4 August 2008

Early Airave customers appear satisfied
Early blog reviews following Sprint’s Airave femtocell launch are enthusiastic…
“I just got my Airave on Tuesday, and so far I am absolutely loving this thing! … All in all I give it a 5 out of 5! The only thing I cannot access is anything that uses the Mobile Broadband [...]