Femtocell developer Ubiquisys, today announced commercial availability of a wide area femtocell solution, providing a coverage area of up to 12km2 (5 sq. miles) at a fraction of the cost of existing solutions. The new femtocell is ideal for rural areas with poor coverage, such as isolated villages, hamlets or farms, notes Unstrung.
The Wide Area Femtocells have a capacity of up to 16 calls and can either be mounted outdoors, or placed indoors with an external antenna, typically attached to the roof of the building. They can be deployed very quickly, because they continuously adapt their radio configuration according to the operator’s policies, working in harmony with the regular mobile network and eliminating the need for a radio planning project.
Picocells generally have higher RF output power than femtocells. They require specialist planning, installation and configuration by radio engineers. A microcell is usually larger than a picocell, though the distinction is not always clear. A microcell uses power control to limit the radius of its coverage area. Typically the range of a microcell is less than a mile wide.
The Ubiquisys wide area femtocell solution is commercially available today and can be combined with the Ubiquisys Grid System to cover still larger areas with multiple femtocells, which form a self-organising mesh of coverage and capacity. The company recently shared the results of a live demonstration of the solution in the field, at the Femtocell Americas event in San Diego.
Chipmaker picoChip has unveiled its roadmap to an end-to-end femtocell reference solution.
Sprint launched AIRAVE by Samsung in August 2008, but it does not support EVDO. AT&T’s 3G MicroCell, like other Femtocells, connects to AT&T’s network via your existing broadband Internet service (such as DSL or cable) and can support up to four simultaneous users in a home or small business setting. DSL Reports points out that Verizon’s $250 Wireless Network Extender has a pricing plan that eats away at your wireless minutes even tough you’re making the wireless call over your own broadband connection.
ABI Research says adoption has been slow, but “deployments in 2010 will pick up.” ABI Research forecasts that the total available femtocell market in 2010 will reach 2.3 million units and rise to 40 million units by 2014.
