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US cable companies to offer WiMAX femtocells
Comcast discloses its plan to enter the mobility market through in-home WiMAX coverage.
The largest form of residential broadband internet access in the United States occur using cable modems followed by DSL services and wireless. Cable operators are synonymous with bundled offers of Internet, home phone, and television services. Mobility is the perceived gap in their portfolio. The recent announcement by Sprint and Clearwire forming a mobile WiMAX joint venture could be the entry point that cable operators are looking for. The WiMAX partnership includes investments from cable operators Bright House Networks, Comcast, and Time Warner Cable amongst others.
Dave Williams, senior VP of wireless and technology for Comcast, provided insight into the company's mobility plans at Femtocells Europe 2008 this week. He revealed that 5 MHz of the spectrum owned by the new Clearwire is made available to the consortium partners to deploy in-home femtocell services. What is a femtocell? A femtocell is a miniature base station about the size of a backpack or even a desktop modem. Unlike the big antennas associated with base stations that cover one or more kilometers, femtocells have a range of tens of meters (hundreds of feet). Femtocells have become a topic of increasing interest in the cellular voice market to fill in coverage holes that exist inside homes and offices.
A WiMAX femtocell would provide improved in-home coverage for WiMAX devices much like a Wi-Fi access point in the home provides localized services to extend wired broadband access. However, WiMAX and cellular voice femtocells utilize licensed radio frequency spectrum owned by the mobile carrier. Femtocells will most likely be a leased device from the operator.
A specification for WiMAX femtocells remains to be addressed. The IEEE has been working to develop a relay standard to overcome the need for backhaul connections at every base station site. Femtocells would utilize the residential broadband connection to manage the mobile connection in addition to other home services.
By Jeff Orr
ORR Technology, LLC
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