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| Femto: sell by dates |
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| Tuesday, 18 December 2007 | |
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Tenfold increase in micro base station deployment by 2008.
A new report from market research firm Infonetics Research says worldwide sales of GSM/GPRS and 3G femtocell access points will heat up quickly once femtocell services become more widely available, with unit shipments expected to grow tenfold from 2007 to 2008, and revenue reaching more than US$630mn in 2010. The Infonetics’ report, ‘Femtocell Access Points Market Outlook’, suggests that the femtocell concept can be applied to a variety of wireless technologies, such as GSM, WCDMA (including HSPA), CDMA2000 (including EV-DO), 4G LTE, WiMAX, and WiBro, but not all of these applications will be necessarily commercially justified. The greatest opportunity, the report indicates, will be presented by 3G femtocells that are deployed in households, where they can be used to provide consistent high-speed coverage as well as improved home-zone type tariffs and services for customers. Infonetics reckons that 3G femtocells offer a practical and potentially much less expensive alternative to enhancing coverage by further investing in denser 3G macrocell networks. In addition, as femtocells are backhauled over an Internet connection, such as a consumer's DSL line, the mobile operator could make operational expenditure savings on macrocellular backhaul. “Femtocells could allow mobile operators to make a significant shift away from just relying on traditional cellular network architecture; the prospect of CapEx and OpEx savings combined with new personal broadband service opportunities is generating intense interest from operators in femtocells, and more vendors are developing products. If the hype translates into deployment, femtocells could radically transform the economics of mobile data and content-based services,” ventures Richard Webb, wireless analyst for Infonetics Research. And in other femtocell rune reading news, the Analysys consultancy states in its report ‘The Business Case for Picocells and Femtocells in the “A small number of MNOs are already using 2G picocells to target businesses with indoor cellular voice services,” according to the report’s co-author Dr Mark Heath. “For example, Spring Mobil in Heath adds: “Femtocells can operate using much cheaper transmission solutions than picocells. This will enable MNOs to address much smaller sites, such as SOHOs and remote offices of corporate organisations.” Other takeaways from the Analysys report include: · a typical indoor coverage solution, using picocells and E1 transmission, requires at least 30 users within the picocell coverage area to be cost-effective for an MNO. If the MNO is unable to increase revenue substantially, then many more users may be required · the cost of transmission is the limiting factor in the business case for picocells. MNOs need to find cheaper alternatives, such as DSL and transmission sharing · 3G femtocells can operate using cheap transmission solutions, such as DSL and have greater potential to support non-voice services than 2G picocells. “Femtocells and picocells will be important in helping MNOs to respond to the threat of dual-mode cellular-WLAN services in the business sector,” reasons report co-author Dr Alastair Brydon. “MNOs can offer services that replicate the benefits of dual-mode handset solutions, using standard cellular handsets, and provide seamless working between the indoor and outdoor cellular networks.” John Williamson |
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