Femtocells – Opportunities and Challenges for Business and Technology

Prof. Simon Saunders, PhD, CEng, FIET Founding Chairman of the Femto Forum, Independent Wireless Technologist and Visiting Professor, University of Surrey. Professor Simon Saunders is an independent specialist in the technology of wireless communications, with a technical and commercial background derived from senior appointments in both industry (including Philips and Motorola) and academia (University of Surrey). He is an author of over 150 articles, books and book chapters. He has acted as a consultant to companies including BAA, BBC, O2, Ofcom, BT, ntl, Mitsubishi and British Land and was CTO of Red-M and CEO of Cellular Design Services Ltd. Simon speaks at and chairs a wide range of international conferences and training courses and has invented several novel wireless technologies. Particular expertise includes in-building wireless systems, radiowave propagation prediction, smart antenna design and mobile system analysis. He currently serves on technical advisory boards of several companies. He is the founding chairman of the Femto Forum, a Visiting Professor to the University of Surrey and is amember of the Ofcom Spectrum Advisory Board. See www.simonsaunders.com for further details. Stuart Carlaw, Vice President Mobile Wireless - ABI Research. StuartCarlawholds a program management role for ABI Research's Wireless Practice, which includes coordinating and planning its wireless infrastructure, mobile operator, wireless handset semiconductor, short range wireless connectivity, fixed mobile convergence, femtocell, mobile device and business mobility research services. He is also lead analyst for the femtocell, fixed-mobile convergence and mobile devices research services. He brings to the task a deep understanding of the critical issues and technologies, stemming from his immersion in these markets for over a decade as both an analyst and an engineer. Prior to joining ABI Research, Stuart was a Telecommunications Technician in the British Army, and then Senior Analyst and laterWireless Research Director at IMS Research. At IMS he was the primary Bluetooth analyst, and responsible for all short range wireless research. He has been quoted and published in a variety of industry and general media, including BBC TV, BBC Radio 5, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, EE Times and many more, and has spoken, moderated or participated in industry events including WiMAX World, TETRA WorldCongress, Bluetooth SIG AHM, PTTWorldCongress and Freescale Technology Forum. Stuart earned a BSc (Honours) in Physical Sciences and Business Management from De Montfort University. Dr Andrea Giustina, Vice President, Systems Engineering - Ubiquisys Ltd. Dr Giustina joined Ubiquisys in early 2006 where he heads the definition of Femtocell offers and system design. With over 15 years of experience in telecoms, he previously held management positions in Lucent Technologies in Systems Engineering and Professional Services for GPRS, WCDMA and IMS Services and was a Researcher for Telecom Italia. Dr Giustina holds a Doctor's degree in Electronics Engineering and a Telecommunications Master, both from Politecnico di Torino, and an MBA from Bath University. Ravi Raj Bhat, Ravi Raj Bhat is an Engineering Director at Continuous Computing, managing its software R&D organisation. Ravi has published over 25 technical papers and articles in technical magazines including IEEE Communication and Electronic Design. Ravi had also co-authored a book titled, Java in Telecommunication, published by John Wiley & Sons in September 2001. Ravi holds an MBA from the Anderson School of Management at University of California, Los Angeles and BTech in Computer Engineering from National Institute of Technology, Karnataka. V. Srinivasa Rao, V. Srinivasa Rao is an Architect for Wireless & IMS Trillium Protocol Software at Continuous Computing. In this capacity, Srinivasa is responsible for conceptualising initial product architecture and design. His oversight includes all the wireless and IMS protocol software products developed by CCPU. Srinivasa has published articles in technical magazines including Electronic Design. His expertise of communications systems ranges from the end-to-end network to signalling protocol software, with a primary focus on IMS and 3G wireless. Mr Srinivasa holds an MTech in Telecommunication Systems & Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur. Rasa Siegberg, Senior Systems Engineer, Mobile & Networking Security Solutions, SafeNet Inc. Rasa Siegberg joined SafeNet in 2005 as Systems Engineer responsible for technical presales and sales support, and various aspects of product management and marketing for the company's portfolio of embedded software security solutions. Currently Rasa provides strategic guidance; sales, product management, and marketing support for all embedded hardware and software security products at SafeNet with a special focus on new technologies within the telecom/mobile industry. He has more than 10 years of experience in telecom, semiconductor, networking and embedded security industries. Prior to joining SafeNet, Rasa worked as a Senior Consultant at Conformiq Software, and as a Product Manager at SSH Communications Security Ltd. He received his MA from Helsinki University, Finland.

About the Authors. Foreword. Preface. Acknowledgements. Abbreviations. List of Figures. List of Tables. 1 Introduction to Femtocells (Simon Saunders). 1.1 Introduction. 1.2 Why Femtocells? The Market Context. 1.3 The Nature of Mobile Broadband Demand. 1.4 What is a Femtocell? 1.5 Applications for Femtocells. 1.6 What a Femtocell is not. 1.7 The Importance of 'Zero-Touch'. 1.8 User Benefits. 1.9 Operator Motivations and Economic Impact. 1.10 Operator Responses. 1.11 Challenges. 1.12 Chapter Overview. 2 Small Cell Background and Success Factors (Simon Saunders). 2.1 Introduction. 2.2 Small Cell Motivations. 2.3 Other Small-Cell Systems. 2.4 The Small-Cell Landscape. 2.5 Emergence of the Femtocell - Critical Success Factors. 2.6 Conclusions. 3 Market Issues for Femtocells (Stuart Carlaw). 3.1 Key Benefits of a Femtocell from Market Perspective. 3.2 Key Primers. 3.3 Key Market Challenges. 3.4 Business Cases for Femtocells. 3.5 Air Interface Choices. 3.6 Product Feature Sets. 3.7 Additional Considerations. 3.8 Adoption Forecasts and Volumes. 3.9 Conclusions. 4 Radio Issues for Femtocells (Simon Saunders). 4.1 Introduction. 4.2 Spectrum Scenarios. 4.3 Propagation in Femtocell Environments. 4.4 Coverage. 4.5 Downlink Interference. 4.6 Interference Challenges and Mitigations. 4.7 Femtocell-to-Femtocell Interference. 4.8 System-Level Performance. 4.9 RF Specifications in WCDMA. 4.10 Health and Safety Concerns. 4.11 Conclusions. 5 Femtocell Networks and Architectures (Andrea Giustina). 5.1 Introduction. 5.2 Challenges. 5.3 Requirements. 5.4 Femto Architectures and Interfaces. 5.5 Key Architectural Choices. 5.6 Other Important Femto Solution Aspects. 5.7 UMTS Femtos. 5.8 CDMA. 5.9 WiMAX. 5.10 GSM. 5.11 LTE. 5.12 Conclusions. 6 Femtocell Management (Ravi Raj Bhat and V. Srinivasa Rao). 6.1 Introduction. 6.2 Femtocell FCAPS Requirements. 6.3 Broadband Forum Auto-Configuration Architecture and Framework. 6.4 Auto-Configuration Data Organisation. 6.5 CPE WAN Management Protocol Overview. 6.6 FAP Service Data Model. 6.7 DOCSIS OSS Architecture and Framework. 6.8 Conclusions. 7 Femtocell Security (Rasa Siegberg). 7.1 Why is Security Important? 7.2 The Threat Model. 7.3 Countering the Threats. 7.4 Conclusions. 8 Femtocell Standards and Industry Groups (Simon Saunders). 8.1 The Importance of Standards. 8.2 GSM. 8.3 WCDMA. 8.4 TD-SCDMA. 8.5 LTE. 8.6 CDMA. 8.7 Mobile WiMAX. 8.8 The Femto Forum. 8.9 The Broadband Forum. 8.10 GSMA. 8.11 Conclusions. 9 Femtocell Regulation (Simon Saunders). 9.1 Introduction. 9.2 Regulatory Benefits of Femtocells. 9.3 Spectrum Efficiency. 9.4 Economic Efficiency. 9.5 Enabling Competition. 9.6 Broadening Access to Services. 9.7 Enabling Innovation. 9.8 Environmental Goals. 9.9 Spectrum Licensing Issues. 9.10 Location. 9.11 Authentication. 9.12 Emergency Calls. 9.13 Lawful Interception and Local IP Access. 9.14 Backhaul Challenges. 9.15 Mobile Termination Rates. 9.16 Competition Concerns. 9.17 Equipment Approvals. 9.18 Examples of Femtocell Regulations. 9.19 Conclusions. 10 Femtocell Implementation Considerations (Simon Saunders). 10.1 Introduction. 10.2 Signal Processing. 10.3 Location. 10.4 Frequency and Timing Control. 10.5 Protocol Implementation. 10.6 RF Implementation. 10.7 System Design and Cost. 10.8 Mobile Device Challenges and Opportunities. 10.9 Conclusions. 11 Business and Service Options for Femtocells (Simon Saunders and Stuart Carlaw). 11.1 Introduction. 11.2 Ways of being a Femtocell Operator. 11.3 Femtocells for Fixed-Line Operators. 11.4 Types of Femtocell Service. 11.5 Service Examples. 11.6 Service Enablers. 11.7 Stages of Femtocell Service Introduction. 11.8 Conclusions. 12 Summary: The Status and Future of Femtocells (Simon Saunders). 12.1 Summary. 12.2 Potential Future Femtocell Landscape. 12.3 Concluding Remarks. References. Further Reading. Appendix: A Brief Guide to Units and Spectrum. Index.