Femtocells: not one tor all and for one

摘要

Femtocells are bipolar devices. This has a little to do with the fact that the devices bridge wireline and wireless and a lot to do with how they're being manically developed while public expectations are deliberately depressed.rnThere is a method to this madness.The mobile industry primarily, but also its wireline brethren, wants to make absolutely sure everything works smoothly before raising public expectations about femtos, so they're working feverishly to put the things together right before revving the marketing hype. And there's another point: Femtos aren'trnfor everybody; they're probably not even for most people. In their purest forms, femtosrnreceive and boost incoming mobile signals and use a broadband wireline connection-either DSL or a cable modem-tornoffload and backhaul the traffic. While there is an opportunity to boost broadband wire-rnless data capabilities, this is far less importantrnthan improving mobile voice, at least in the earliest product iterations.rn"It's bipolar in the sense this has tremen-rndous utility in some cases and no utility in others," says Tony Melone, senior vice president and CTO of Verizon Wireless. "If you have good coverage in your home-three bars is good coverage-there's absolutely zerornvalue that you will get out of this.