Femtocells: integration is the name of the game

Well, of course, it’s not just femtocells that this statement applies to – especially at home. The most obvious example is the digital TV – who actually wants another box of electronics cluttering up their lounge? It’s the same with your wireless router. It’s best tucked away somewhere out of sight. After all, few of these boxes are objects of great, if indeed any, beauty.

But as for the functionality that they provide? Well that’s a different story! The vast majority of us want or need to be connected.

Anyway, why would I want a femtocell? Well there are different use cases based around factors like improving in-building coverage, channelling data over the fixed broadband network rather than the mobile network to give a better broadband experience, and of course fancy new services that you can have using your mobile. Like the Facebook virtual fridge note.

With the Femtocell World Summit next week, we’ll see a lot of news and it’s an exciting time with several key hurdles overcome in the last six months or so as reported by The FemtoForum. Femtocells are set to hit the market and the market could develop in different ways.

Hitting the market of course brings me back to the point about integration. In their early stages most Femtocells will be add-on boxes that plug into your router. But if, like me and most other people, you don’t really want another box then having a femtocell module already inside your shiny new router will be more attractive.

All I’ll need then is an attractive tariff from my mobile operator, and some compelling new services and benefits that will make subscribing to the femtocell service irresistible!

By Howard Wilcox from Juniper Research