Motorola tests 3G femtocell technology in Europe

Motorola on Monday announced that it has completed the testing of its 3G femtocell technology and has moved on to a trial with a major European carrier.

The femtocell technology being trailed is based on open standards and includes customer premises equipment, 3G devices, a core network concentrator, systems integration services, and Motorola's customer premises equipment management software, called Netopia Broadband Server.

Motorola didn't disclose the name of the European carrier that is testing its femtocell technology.

Femtocells are small base stations designed for use in homes and offices to help spread cellular coverage inside buildings. They will attract more than 100 million users in the next five years, according to ABI Research.

Consumers benefit from the technology by being able to keep a phone call or an Internet session going as they transition from wireless networks inside their homes to outside networks. The switch is seamless when they use their 3G-enabled mobile devices, according to Motorola.

Potentially, the use of femtocells can improve indoor wireless coverage and help reduce "in-home" call charges on mobile devices.

Motorola is part of the Femto Forum, a nonprofit organization founded in 2007 to promote the deployment of femtocells worldwide.

Earlier this year, U.S. wireless carrier Sprint launched a trial in Denver and Indianapolis to test femtocell hardware and service called Airave, which is designed to provide subscribers with enhanced cellular coverage in their homes and home offices. The technology works similarly to T-Mobile's HotSpot @Home service. However, instead of using Wi-Fi to extend coverage, Airave uses femtocells.

Carriers are expected to install femtocells to make their networks more efficient and to provide better cellular coverage indoors. Traffic will be routed using the Internet Protocol, which means carriers will be able to offer additional services like voice over IP and IPTV to their subscribers.

Alcatel-Lucent Losing 3G Business to Ericsson

Alcatel-Lucent shares fell by more than 2% in early trading this morning after a report in the Financial Times said the telecom networking company is losing business to rival Ericsson. The paper reported that AT&T was doing more business with Ericsson.

In 2004, AT&T awarded a $2 billion infrastructure contract to Ericsson, Lucent and Siemens to upgrade its U.S wireless network. Under the original terms of the deal, Ericsson was to get about $900 million, Lucent $700 million and Siemens $400 million, but according to the paper, Alcatel-Lucent delayed delivering the 3G technology and Ericsson "stepped in." Ericsson's portion of the contract now exceeds 50%.

The report also said that AT&T had considered dropping Altactel-Lucent from the contract entirely, but so far has kept the network supplier.

In the report, Alcatel-Lucent responded by saying "We continue to be a critical WCDMA supplier to AT&T."

3G Femtocell Agreement Between Nokia and Thomson

(07/06/2007 8:21 AM EDT)

PARIS " Seeking to enhance the user's experience of 3G services at home, Thomson and Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) announced they have concluded a collaboration agreement on the development of a 3G femto cell home access solution. Home base station solutions, also called femto cells, have recently attracted much attention. The concept is to provide the mobile user with a small box similar to wireless routers, which guarantees mobile cellular coverage at home. The femto market could reach ten to twelve million units by 2010, according to market research firms ABI Research and Ovum. The terms of the agreement call for the combination of both parties' technologies. They indeed explained Thomson's femto cell-enabled residential gateway would be coupled with NSN's 3G Femto Home Access network solution so as to "allow operators to seamlessly deliver compelling 3G multimedia services such as music downloads and video available in the home on any WCDMA 3G handset, with unrivalled quality of service, network security and manageability." The two partners agreed that trials of the 3G Home Access solution, including Thomson's residential gateway, would begin early 2008. Commercial deployments are expected during the third quarter of 2008.

WiMAX In Europe Facing A Brighter Future Where Technology-Neutral Spectrum Is Available 6/20/2007 London -- WiMAX networks in Europe are being deployed in most countries using spectrum at 3.5 GHz. However these are mostly confined to offering fixed wireless services. The mobile version of WiMAX (IEEE802.16e-2005) is also being deployed at 3.5 GHz and has been trialed in The Netherlands using 2.6 GHz spectrum. This latter is earmarked as the UMTS extension band for 3G operators to use.

The European Commission and several national regulators, including Norway, Sweden, and the UK, want the situation to change, as does the WiMAX Forum. The ITU has now also agreed that OFDM-based technologies should be included in the IMT2000 standard. This will place mobile WiMAX on the same footing as 3G mobile when it comes to using the 3G extension bands and, potentially, existing 3G bands.

“This is a good sign for technology neutrality becoming the accepted approach for spectrum auctions in the future,” says ABI Research analyst Ian Cox. “Mobile WiMAX products will start to appear in 2007 and can be used in unpaired spectrum, giving them an opportunity not available to UMTS.”

Cox further comments that, “Mobile WiMAX could compete in the market against 3G, HSPA, HSPA+ and LTE, and provide an entry path currently only available to incumbent operators.”

Meanwhile fixed WiMAX applications are already being deployed to complement and compete with DSL and cable networks in rural and other underserved areas, particularly in the new EU member states.

For users, says Cox, WiMAX will enable broadband services, including VoIP, to be offered over SIP-enabled networks. All services will be IP-based, offering high data rates and low latency, along with mobile network data speeds comparable to those of fixed networks.

For vendors, WiMAX will allow development of a new market to replace declining 3G revenues.

A new ABI Research Brief, “WiMAX in Europe” reviews the European market for WiMAX. It examines the current use of 3.5 GHz spectrum along with the regulatory situation and prospects for the future. It forms part of ABI Research’s Mobile Broadband Research Service, which also includes Research Reports, other Research Briefs, Market Data, ABI Insights, and analyst inquiry support.

SOURCE: ABI Research

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