Comments on: Like Fixed-Mobile Convergence, Femtocells Are on a Road to Nowhere

By: Femtocells Get Out of Our Homes and Into Our Cities «

Femtocells Get Out of Our Homes and Into Our Cities « — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 15:44:39 +0000

[...] at GigaOM have long argued that femtocells, which act as a mini cell tower and connect through a home’s existing broadband connection, [...]

By: Free or Not, Femtocell Deployments Are on the Rise

Free or Not, Femtocell Deployments Are on the Rise — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 23:02:08 +0000

[...] me. Last week, I tested a UMA call on T-Mobile’s new Nokia E73 Mode and it worked flawlessly, mirroring Om’s UMA experiences on his BlackBerry. Unfortunately, carriers can’t guarantee the quality of such voice calls due to [...]

By: Picochip Gives Femtocells a New Lease on Life

Picochip Gives Femtocells a New Lease on Life — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 00:01:27 +0000

[...] Picochip Gives Femtocells a New Lease on Life By Stacey Higginbotham Jun. 4, 2010, 5:00pm PDT No Comments 0 Picochip this week said it has built a chip that can support far more mobile users on a femtocell and can also help carriers handle the problem of chatty phones that overwhelm networks with notifications that they’re moving from one tower to another, as well as push email, Twitter and other application requests. The resulting femtocell could support up to 60 users in dedicated conversation or web browsing, as well as up to 400 mobile phones engaged in general network chatter. This takes femtocells out of the home, where the business case was always weak, and into public spaces and businesses that could actually afford to pay for the devices and better cell phone coverage. Maybe it will be just what the femtocell market needs to finally take off. [...]

By: Mobile Offload: It’s So Hot Right Now – GigaOM

Mobile Offload: It’s So Hot Right Now – GigaOM — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 01:02:14 +0000

[...] of the new products use gear designed for fixed mobile convergence (FMC) through Wi-Fi and femtocells, and a few are beginning to include support for 4G technologies. Tellabs, like the 6-year-old [...]

By: Future Of Femtocells – Finding Room In Wi-Fi Era! « Telecomblogs

Future Of Femtocells – Finding Room In Wi-Fi Era! « Telecomblogs — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:54:56 +0000

[...] day while I was going through few posts related to Femtocells, I wondered is it really safe to completely disregard the future of [...]

By: Analyst: Femtocells Aren’t Dead Yet!

Analyst: Femtocells Aren’t Dead Yet! — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 01:01:09 +0000

[...] | Monday, November 23, 2009 | 5:00 PM PT | 0 comments | 0 tweets retweet » Here at GigaOM we’ve pretty much decided that the femtocell market is dead. At the very least, it’s significantly smaller than what [...]

By: Anon

Anon — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:50:26 +0000

When you state that “3G radios require a lot of power relative to Wi-Fi radios”, you are talking apples-to-oranges.

Sure, the power a cell phone uses in the home to connect to the macro network (whose tower is outside and God knows how far away, so the signal has to blast through the walls of the house and reach the tower)is going to be a lot more than it needs to connect to the Wi-Fi access point which is, at most, upstairs or downstairs.

When a femtocell is introduced to a house, the power requirement for the 3G modem will be significantly reduced. One could argue that a Wi-Fi enabled 3G phone using WiFi will burn power faster than a 3G phone using a femtocell as the Wi-Fi enabled phone has to have two radios active – the Wi-Fi radio and the 3G radio (so the phone can receive calls from the macro network) while the 3G phone using a femtocell only requires one radio to be active.

By: Who Needs Femtocells If We Have Wi-Fi?

Who Needs Femtocells If We Have Wi-Fi? — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:26:04 +0000

[...] the startups and large equipment-makers who are building the devices. But so far, the market has failed to materialize, not least because consumers don’t want to pay a monthly fee or buy equipment in order to [...]

By: George

George — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 20:36:35 +0000

1.) At&t’s femtocell has no monthly fees. It’s only a monthly fee if you want unlimited calls

2.) You ARE FING DREAMING!!!. The At&t femtocell has a GPS locator built in and will only work within the geographical confines of the service plan you currently have. The microcell will only work after it establishes it’s GPS location.

By: mikeeeee

mikeeeee — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 21:12:11 +0000

i have t-mobile hotspot@home service.

it’s friggin’ great.

i live in nowhere, tennessee.

only thing i don’t like is my g-1 is not UMA capable.

when t-mo gives me an android with UMA, my life will be complete.

i’m really surprised that a lot of people who have dead cellphones in buildings are not clamoring for UMA.

By: Femtocell market update for week of 24 August 2009 « 3G In The Home

Femtocell market update for week of 24 August 2009 « 3G In The Home — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 13:47:20 +0000

[...] GigaOM says femtocells are on a “road to nowhere” [...]

By: Rupert Baines

Rupert Baines — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:13:55 +0000

I have to declare a bias (we make the chips for femtocells) but I think there are a few other things to consider.

Bob Metcalfe famously said “Always bet on the installed base”: while next year there will be 100 million smartphones that could do voice-over-WiFi there will be 3billion-plus handsets that can all work with femtocells.

You are absolutely right to stress that user experience is key — which is why I’m surprised you don’t see this as one of femto’s biggest advantages.

People’s experience with femtos is great: they may complain about the business model, but no-one complains about now getting five bar coverage, with clear voice and no messing.

In contrast, user experience with voice-over-WiFi is pretty poor. While the iPhone does a great job (no surprise) on most smart phones it is a real chore to set switch over to WiFi, to go through authentication etc. It is like dialling the discount code was in the old days: I can’t be bothered.

Meanwhile, the femto just works: automatically, with no hassle, and with your existing handsets.

One indication is operators: Verizon, Sprint, Vodafone, Softbank have all launched femtocells. AT&T and DoCoMo have said they are about to, and there are many more

Clearly, it has taken longer than we all hoped (but things usually do…) but I’d say that by this time next year you may have a different opinion.

By: Andy Tiller

Andy Tiller — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 18:00:12 +0000

Is WiFi really the answer for FMC? Ofcom recently found lots of problems with WiFi service quality in the UK (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/05/10/ofcom_mass_wi_fi/). This might explain why only T-Mobile and Orange France have done much with UMA / dual mode FMC services. As the Verizon guy said, “There is no way to put the controls around that service to give our customers a guaranteed great experience” (http://online.wsj.com/public/article_print/SB117815938377190497.html).

By: Martin Kuhn

Martin Kuhn — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:22:11 +0000

Om – As US carriers are on the cusp of LTE deployment, Why anyone would buy a non LTE compatible Femtocell, knowing they would need to replace in 2-3 years?

By: Jesse Kopelman

Jesse Kopelman — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 21:00:48 +0000

Come on Om, are you really surprised? I told you how this would work out, 2 years ago. All the hype was coming from vendors, and that is not a good thing for something where carrier support is integral! Self-installable repeaters were a good idea 10 years ago (and took off in many parts of the world), but fell flat in the US due to lack of carrier support. FMC was a good idea 5 years ago (and could have made T-Mobile USA a real contender to AT&T and Verizon), but fell flat due to lack of carrier support. Femtocells were the weakest of these 3 ideas, so is it any surprise they are falling flat?

By: Jesse Kopelman

Jesse Kopelman — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 20:53:53 +0000

Except femtocell, as used here to describe a very low power 2/3G radio with IP backhaul, has nothing to do with WiFi . . .