Study: consumers likely to greet femtocells with yawns

Femtocells are a popular idea for solving the problems associated with using mobile phones indoors, but a new study indicates that the solution faces a number of barriers in the US.In-Stat analyst Allen Nogee expects that femtocells, in-home cell base stations designed to augment cellular networks, will grow from nearly zero last year to over 30 million units installed worldwide in 2012. But Nogee thinks that just over 12 million (or 40 percent) of these will be found in US homes.Femtocells seem to be the current big idea for improving indoor residential coverage from AT&T, Sprint Nextel, and Verizon Wireless. Sprint introduced their Airave last year; Verizon released its Network Extender last week; and AT&T will offer its 3G MicroCell sometime soon. Pricing varies, but the intent is the same: use a subscriber’s residential broadband to backhaul calls that would otherwise be made over a cellular network or not at all.To read this ars technica report in full, see:
arstechnica.com/telecom/news/2009/02/study-consumers-likely-to-greet-femtocells-with-yawns.ars