www.scf.io/ www.smallcellforum.

org
RELEASE
DOCUMENT
Small Cell Forum Case Studies
Sprint SoftBank AeroMobile GlobeWireless Vodafone
Greece City of Zaanstad Network Norway AT&T
February 2013
060.01.01

SMALL CELL FORUM
One scf.io/


Small Cell Forum supports the wide-scale adoption of small cells. Its mission is
to accelerate small cell adoption to change the shape of mobile networks and
maximise the potential of the mobile internet.
Small cells is an umbrella term for operator-controlled, low-powered radio access
nodes, including those that operate in licensed spectrum and unlicensed carrier-grade
Wi-Fi. Small cells typically have a range from 10 metres to several hundred metres.
These contrast with a typical mobile macrocell that might have a range of up to several
tens of kilometres. The term small cells covers femtocells, picocells, microcells and
metrocells.
Small Cell Forum is a not-for-profit, international organisation, with membership open
to providers of small cell technology and to operators with spectrum licences for
providing mobile services.
At the time of writing, the Small Cell Forum has 141 members including 68 operators
representing more than 3 billion mobile subscribers 46 per cent of the global total
as well as telecoms hardware and software vendors, content providers and innovative
start-ups.
The Small Cell Forum is technology-agnostic and independent. It is not a standards-
setting body, but works with standards organisations and regulators worldwide to
provide an aggregated view of the small cell market.
This document forms part of the Small Cell Forums Release One which addresses the
full range of applications for small cells: Home, Enterprise, Metro, Rural. The main
theme of Release One is the Home, and includes the complete body of work operators
will need to know for wide-scale deployment of femtocells intended for home or small
office applications. These applications are based typically indoors and involve locations
where a single femtocell is usually sufficient. Both 3GPP and 3GPP2 femtocells are
included.
Release One also contains works clarifying market needs and addressing barriers to
deployment of enterprise, metro and rural small cells.
The Small Cell Forum Release website can be found here www.scf.io. A description and
roadmap for the release programme can be found here www.scf.io/doc/100

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JUNE 2012
Sprint announced that it had shipped more
than 250,000 femtocells during March 2011 and
more than 600,000 during May 2012, making its
deployment among the biggest in the world. As
expected, its deployment has gone through an
evolution of technologies and equipment while the
business case has been incrementally improved
using knowledge gained from the initial deployment.
The following sections outline Sprints history,
present offerings and future vision for small cells.
The past: Consumer 2G (Airave 1.0)
Sprint initially started looking at indoor coverage
enhancement technologies long before its launch
of femtocell services in 2007. It was responding
to a common challenge in the US market, where
rural areas and geographies with very low
population concentration do not justify the rollout
of a macrocell site. All operators in the US were
assessing outdoor technologies to improve their
coverage and Sprint realised that mobile handsets
and devices are particularly used indoors, hence
the need for indoor coverage. Although there were
and still are technologies available for indoor
coverage, their disadvantages still outweigh the
benets of coverage. For example, indoor repeaters
operate under the assumption that the macro
network has strong presence in the area, something
that is not valid for rural areas. Plus, indoor
repeaters put an additional strain on the capacity
of the macro network whereas a femtocell ofoads
that trafc.
At this point, Sprint realised that an indoor
femtocell would be the best solution to this
problem especially for households that are
already equipped with xed broadband connections.
Sprint then developed and launched its original
femtocell in three US markets during 2007, followed
by a nationwide launch in 2008.
CASE STUDY
|

AT&T
A small cell success story
Sprint Nextel was the rst mobile operator in the world to launch femtocell
services. Given that Sprint was assessing the use of femtocells before the
technology was even given a standardised name, it is the operator that is most
advanced in terms of technology evolution and market maturity.
CASE STUDY | Sprint | A small cell success story
The original femtocell, Airave 1.0 (see g. 1), was a proprietary
solution from Samsung. The Airave 1.0 supported three simultaneous
voice or data sessions, but data rates were constrained due to
the 1xRTT air interface technology and could only go as high as a
theoretical 153kbps.
Sprint provided the original Airave 1.0 to customers with coverage
problems with an upfront cost and a monthly fee. Despite the added
cost to the subscriber, the femtocell services were accepted in the
marketplace but there was consumer criticism over the fact that
femtocells improved a core operator asset (coverage) at an extra
cost to the subscriber. Moreover, marketing and selling the femtocell
access point in a traditional retail environment is a complex task for
any mobile operator, especially when handsets are considered as
revenue-generating and femtocells as problem-solving. Nevertheless,
Sprint was the rst operator to discover the benets of femtocells
for indoor coverage while reducing churn.
Despite its success and being rst to market, Sprint realised that
subscribers need higher data speeds when connected and that its
deployment would benet from a multi-vendor ecosystem that
would also improve cost efciencies.
Fig. 1: The original femtocell,
Airave 1.0
Source: Sprint
The present: Consumer and enterprise
3G (Airave 2.0)
Having learned from its rst femtocell
deployment, Sprint developed a
new femtocell platform with open,
standardised interfaces, IMS core,
3GPP2 and SIP signaling. The femtocell
platform was designed to support
multiple venue-specic devices and
device manufacturers. In August 2010,
the Airave 2.0 consumer femtocell was
launched on the new platform.
Consumer femtocells
Airave 2.0 is a consumer femtocell,
manufactured by Airvana (see g. 2).
It provides up to 5000 square feet
of dedicated enhanced coverage, six
simultaneous active voice or 3G data
sessions, and Sprint Direct Connect,
Sprints push-to-talk service.
Another benet of Airave 2.0 is that it
provides a two-port router which can
be used in cases where cable modem
users only have a single LAN port which
is used by their desktop computer.
Although a minor improvement to
its specication especially when
considering bill of materials for the
femtocell access point the router
provides a functionality that was
previously a major barrier for those
customers who did not have an
additional LAN port for multiple devices
(PC, femtocell, etc.).
Another benet of the integrated
routers functionality is that voice is
prioritised over other data trafc, thus
providing a high quality of experience
for end users. Moreover, as with Airave
1.0, the Airave 2.0 operates in open
access mode, meaning that any Sprint
subscriber can connect to the femtocell
when in close proximity to the device,
although it is possible to establish a
whitelist that only allows specic mobile
users to have access.
However, the biggest change compared
with the original femtocell was that
Sprint changed its business model. With
the Airave 2.0, the operator capitalised
the cost of each femtocell access point
which in turn made the femtocell a
piece of network infrastructure rather
than a device that belongs to end users.
This allowed Sprint to offer the Airave
2.0 free to qualifying customers. This
type of femtocell deployment needs
to be carefully controlled in order to
limit uptake in case of strong demand;
however, individual operator femtocell
deployments even in the US have
not yet reached the order of a million.
Sprint has reported that it has exceeded
all the business case goals that were
set for its femtocell deployment: it
shipped more Airave 2.0 femtocells in
one month that it shipped in total of the
Airave 1.0.
Enterprise femtocells
In addition to being successful in the
consumer market, Sprint realised that
femtocells are a natural t for the
enterprise market where a variety of
legacy technologies were being used to
improve coverage. Despite providing an
enhanced user experience for the most
premium customer group, providing
indoor coverage for enterprise
customers is a very expensive process
for mobile operators especially when
repeaters, distributed antennas or
other passive elements are considered.
However, enterprise femtocells
signicantly reduce capex and opex due
to their ease of deployment, remote
in-band conguration and the broadband
internet connection.
Fig. 2: Sprints Airave 2.0 Fig. 3: Sprints Airave
Pro Connect enterprise
femtocell
Source: Sprint Source: Informa
Telecoms & Media
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CASE STUDY | Sprint | A small cell success story
In November 2011, Sprint launched its
enterprise grade femtocell, Airave Pro
Connect (see g. 3) from UbeeAirWalk.
This femtocell provides up to 100,000
square feet of dedicated enhanced
coverage, 29 simultaneous active
voice sessions, 32 simultaneous active
3G data sessions, clustering (handoff
between multiple devices), as well as
Sprint Direct Connect. The enterprise
femtocell is part of Sprints enhanced
coverage portfolio for large business,
designed to reduce capex spending and
drastically reduce the use of repeaters.
It enables Sprint to capture smaller
business opportunities that previously
could not have been addressed.
Sprints enterprise femtocell is not
for direct sale, but rather is part of
a solutions portfolio that requires
the customer to make a multi-year
commitment. The operator also reports
that the cost of rolling out coverage
in this environment is half what it was
for non-femtocell technologies, thus
providing a very powerful tool for
enterprise customer retention and
churn reduction.
The future: Public small cells
Sprint has announced an LTE network rollout with a strong focus on small cells. Its VP of Network
Development and Engineering laid out a detailed plan for the operators small cell strategy:
Sprint will double its femtocell rollouts in the consumer and enterprise environments during 2013
and will start using femtocells to add coverage and capacity in indoor public problem areas.
During 2013, Sprint will roll out picocells in high-trafc areas, starting with 400 buildings, each of
which will support 100 to 200 individual small cells.
In late 2013 and 2014, Sprint will deploy outdoor picocells in dense urban areas to improve the
outdoor user experience and alleviate capacity constraints.
Sprint has also said that it expects future networks to be heterogeneous, meaning that existing
macrocells may be complemented with small cells to alleviate either coverage or capacity constraints.
Sprint
http://www.sprint.com
This case study was originally published in Informas
Small Cell Market Status report, Q2 2012. Reproduced with kind
permission of Informa Telecoms & Media.
NOVEMBER 2012
The Japanese market is one of the most advanced
and competitive environments in the global
landscape where 2G has already been switched off
in favour of 3G and now LTE. Moreover, indoor
coverage is a major issue for all mobile operators
and a variety of technologies are deployed to
improve indoor reception: boosters, repeaters,
Distributed Antennas (DAS) and most recently,
small cells.
A signicant challenge in the Japanese market
is regulation, where femtocell access points are
subject to a paid licence compared to repeaters
of mobile handsets. This increases the cost of
the femtocell deployment considerably, especially
when large scale deployments are planned and the
femtocell service is open to all subscribers.
Small cell deployments
SoftBank is believed to be the rst, and to date
only, national operator worldwide to have deployed
residential, enterprise and public access small
cells in both rural and metropolitan areas. It has
also deployed more than 270,000 public access
Wi-Fi hotspots. SoftBank has also demonstrated
how diverse a range of backhaul options can
be employed for small cells it uses DSL, bre,
wireless and even satellite in rural areas. Its
deployment began with femtocells in the rst
quarter of 2009 for the consumer and enterprise
markets and has since extended to include public
access small cells in rural areas (outdoors) as well
as in metropolitan areas (indoors) in shops.
SoftBank reports that all of its small cell
deployments so far are focused on coverage as
expected in the Japanese market although the
consumer femtocells are very likely to be used for
trafc ofoad as well. The residential and enterprise
femtocells support up to eight users and data rates
of up to 14.4Mbps. The public access small cell
models in rural and metropolitan areas support 16
users and data rates of up to 14.4Mbps.
Small cell success story: SoftBank
SoftBank Mobile is the cellular business arm of SoftBank Group, a Japanese
telecommunications and internet company that also includes xed, internet,
media and marketing businesses. SoftBank operates a WCDMA network and has
recently launched LTE with aggressive deployment targets.
CASE STUDY
|

SoftBank
CASE STUDY | SoftBank | Small cell success story
Following its initial consumer and enterprise
deployment, SoftBank launched public small cells
during Q1 2011 and rural small cells during Q4
2011. The operator has deployed small cells in
shops while the rural outdoor small cells are
deployed on concrete poles. SoftBank plans to
start LTE small cell trials in 2013. In total, Informa
Telecoms & Media estimates that SoftBank has
deployed more than 100,000 units in the consumer,
enterprise, metropolitan and rural areas. The
following provides a breakdown for SoftBanks small
cell deployments.
One notable feature of SoftBanks deployment has
been the emphasis on rural. Few other carriers have
shown the same level of deployment as SoftBank.
A substantial portion of SoftBanks public
deployments have been in rural areas, and it is
likely that the operator can now boast the highest
percentage population coverage of any carrier.
The operator has installed small cells in remote
villages that would not normally be economic to
serve, as the population and usage is too sparse to
justify traditional infrastructure but using more
cost-effective small cells changes that calculation.
Indeed, these isolated areas often do not have xed
broadband, (hence the need for satellite backhaul
referred to above) so it becomes possible for
communities to get online through 3G on their
phones or dongles for the rst time.
These systems do not need high capacity (by
denition there are few people there) so 16 users
is sufcient, but the range must be increased over a
standard small cell so need both a bigger radio and
some optimisation to the modem.
A very powerful and touching variation on this
was described by SoftBank last year. In the wake
of the tragic earthquake and tsunami, much of
the communications infrastructure in Sendai was
Residential
Rural
Enterprise
Source: Informa
Telecoms &
Media
Fig. 1: SoftBanks small cell deployment
segmentation
destroyed or unusable. SoftBank
reacted quickly, equipping 4x4 vehicles
with diesel generators, small cell
basestations and satellite connectivity
and sent them to disaster areas. As
soon as they were activated they could
connect and deliver an autonomous,
self-contained bubble of coverage
enabling communities to connect to
loved ones following the crisis.
While we think of small cells, or
communications more broadly, as
important for social reasons or
economic reasons it is important to
appreciate how powerful and essential
they can be in such critical situations.
Underlying technology
SoftBank has been one of the few
operators to deploy femtocells with
IMS, contrary to most operators that
chose to deploy dedicated femtocell
gateways to aggregate trafc from the
access points. By doing so, SoftBank
has capitalised on the benets of an
IMS-based deployment which is easy to
expand, carrier-grade and maintains high
levels of service quality. The company
had one of the earliest 3G networks
(dating back to FOMA) and this
probably made it more sensible to jump
to IMS rather than further invest in the
3G Iuh approach. As such, they used
femtocells somewhat to test their IMS
services as they have moved to
that for LTE.
SoftBank has used several backhaul
technologies, including DSL, bre
and even satellite in rural areas. The
operator reports that it even uses
wireless backhaul for small cells until a
xed line is deployed.
It is notable that the company has used
satellite broadly, which makes sense in
rural areas with limited broadband, but
has not been widely copied by other
carriers to date.
Business model
SoftBank claims that the pricing model
for all of its small cells is free of charge
to the end customer and it expects that
it will remain so in the future. Given
that coverage is a major concern in
Japan due to the very high population
concentration, SoftBanks free small
cell services may provide a competitive
advantage over its competitors.
Similar to many other operators,
SoftBanks small cell strategy is to
initially increase coverage, and then use
a dense small cell network for capacity
ofoad. Finally, the same network may
be used for value added services.
SoftBank has deployed more than
100,000 small cell units in consumer,
enterprise, metropolitan and rural areas.
Air interface WCDMA/HSPA
Access model Open to all SoftBank subscribers
Deployment type Consumer, enterprise, rural and public areas
Core network IMS
Backhaul DSL, bre, wireless and satellite
Pricing Free of charge
First million deployed Sprint Wireless (US)
Fig. 2: SoftBanks small cell deployment specications
Source:
SoftBank
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Lessons and conclusions
SoftBank reports that initially its free
femtocell offer resulted in some users
accepting the device but never activating
it. Over time and with some expense it
managed to resolve this issue.
On a more technical note, SoftBank
also reports that in some urban public
small cells, a very high population
concentration can saturate a small cell.
For example, in coffee shops where
there are large queues at certain times,
the small cell may not be able to handle
all subscribers. In these cases, the small
cells are able to calibrate their power
levels so users close to the edge are
transferred to the macro network.
Newer small cells with higher capacity
could ease this situation.
SoftBank and all other Japanese
operators would also benet from
a more relaxed regulatory landscape
where consumer/enterprise small cells
could be freely deployed by end users
without any, or reduced, licence costs to
the operator, providing more freedom
to implement new business models and
pricing schemes. Nevertheless, SoftBank
is perhaps the most advanced operator
in terms of small deployment with a
consumer, enterprise, and public rural
and metropolitan strategy.
SoftBanks strategy includes consumer, enterprise, public
rural and metropolitan deployments.
SoftBank
http://mb.softbank.jp/en/
This case study was originally published in Informas
Small Cell Market Status report, Q4 2012. Reproduced with kind
permission of Informa Telecoms & Media.
FEBRUARY 2013
Airborne GSM small cell at-a-glance
GSM solution for airline passengers
Backhauls to satellite
Up to two picocells per aeroplane, serving up to
24 simultaneous calls
Commercial launch: March 2008
Technology provided by AeroMobile, Panasonic
and ip.access
AeroMobile Communications Limited is a UK-
based company owned by Panasonic and Telenor.
It provides 2.5G GSM and mobile data services on
board a number of aircraft, badged as the eXPhone
product in conjunction with Panasonics Global
Communication Suite on its Ku-band satcom-
equipped platform. AeroMobile also offers airborne
GSM services over the Inmarsat SwiftBroadband
L-band platform. Its promotional literature says that
it provides world class, proven technology and
services that allow the safe and managed use of
passengers own mobile phones and PDAs in-ight.
But terms like proven and safe are not just public
relations-speak, as we shall see.
ip.access was a natural t for AeroMobile. ip.access
has been deploying small cell solutions for more
than ten years, providing more than 100 customers
around the world with the capability to accelerate
the introduction of small cell solutions into their
networks irrespective of use case, technology or
deployment model.
The use case studied here is certainly not the
home or enterprise that so many of us associate
with small cells but its a highly effective use of
the technology. In fact picocell-enabled in-ight
GSM is a very popular service with passengers
and a growing number of airlines and operators.
Mark Pittick, Vice President Sales, Europe, ip.access,
says: Passengers today are increasingly demanding
seamless connectivity. They simply dont accept that
they should be out of contact for that ten-hour
long-haul ight or even a one-hour short-haul hop.
ip.access with its small, lower powered picocells has
been well placed to provide one of the key enabling
technologies into this market for over ten years and
has invested time and money with leading innovative
communications players such as AeroMobile to help
make this service a reality.
But it wasnt always that way. As John Little, CTO &
COO at AeroMobile, says: During one of our rst
GSM in the air: no mere ight of fancy
CASE STUDY
|

Aviation
CASE STUDY | AeroMobile | GSM in the air: no mere ight of fancy
meetings with a telco operator they pointed out
of the window and said: Theres been more trafc
from that cell tower in the last hour than there
would be on one ight. So their initial interest
levels were very low. But things have changed.
Now you have to be connected on a plane, he
says, adding, and that original telco along with
more than 200 others has now signed a roaming
agreement with us!
AeroMobile offers an on-board GSM network that
enables the passenger to roam on the aircraft as if
he or she were roaming in another country. Up to
two picocells are employed for capacity in some
cases and coverage in others (for example, a dual
deck A380 would require two base stations for
coverage). Figure 1 shows a standard installation
on-board a commercial aircraft. In order to achieve
RF coverage in the cabin two RF leaky feeder cables
(basically coaxial cables that leak RF down their
length) run down the port and starboard of the
aircraft cabin. The leaky feeders are connected to an
RF combining unit that connects the picocell(s) and
the Network Control Unit (NCU) installed at the
rear of aircraft.
There are two NCUs feeding each of the leaky
feeder cables via the RF combiner. Put very simply,
as the aircraft ies over different countries the
system stops the mobile phone receiving a signal
from the ground network. The picocell RF level is
positioned above the RF noise oor generated by
the NCU such that it provides the only GSM
service on the aircraft and is not interrupted by
accidental terrestrial signals.
The NCUs and the picocell(s) are connected via
ethernet to an on-board server which contains part
of the base station controller (BSC), the control
system and the radio interference avoidance system
(RIAS). The control system and RIAS together
manage (1) what frequency bands the NCUs will
operate on and (2) the BTS frequency, changing
them automatically as the aircraft ies across
different countries. The RIAS and the control
system also ensure that the service is enabled and
disabled automatically at the correct altitude as the
aircraft takes off and lands, with no need for the
crew to be involved.
But thats not all. The ip.access picocell has to be
in avionic format a form factor that is specied
in the airline industry. This means the equipment
had to go through a strict regime of testing
covering vibration, RF susceptibility, RF radiation,
temperature, temperature variation, shock and
crack safety and many more environmental tests.
Its called RTCA DO160D, a complete set of
environmental testing you have to carry out on all
avionics installed on aircraft.
When using commercial off-the-shelf products
such as the ip.access BTS you have to be especially
careful to maintain traceability of components
and manufacture to ensure that the units being
delivered are to the same standard as the units
tested during their environmental testing. So we
have to work very closely with ip.access to control
manufacturing changes, says Little. The picocells
were already designed by ip.access to
meet the specied range for normal
operation of minus 10 degrees up
to plus 55, says Pittick. That was
something we didnt have to improve for
this application.
So, says Little, Before we committed
to using the product we spent time
in an environmental chamber where
we could take the commercial off-the-
shelf product and vibrate it. We found
that the oscillator was FM modulated
with the vibration. This resulted in the
transmission being badly degraded
at 1.8GHz. So we changed to a more
robust oscillator. The AeroMobile
service operates over different satellite
bearers: L-band and Ku band. In the
future it will also operate over Ka band.
Of the two available today, Inmarsats
L-band, while global, has a higher
latency/lower bandwidth than Ku band
and care needs to be taken in the design
to manage the GSM signalling due to the
higher satcom latency.
Panasonics own Ku-band system has
higher bandwidth and lower latency
and is committed to over 80 per cent
of planes served by AeroMobile. Etihad,
Emirates, Virgin Atlantic, Gulf, SAS,
Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, Cathay
Pacic, Transaero, Aer Lingus, Air France,
KLM, Turkish Airlines, and Lionair are
just some of the names signed up to
operate or that are actually operating
Ku band that will eventually see
service in hundreds of aircraft.
A single picocell on the Ku band aircraft
can be congured to support up to ten
simultaneous calls, although this can vary
depending on the airlines requirements.
With a dual picocell conguration up to
24 calls could be supported, but Little
comments that very few airlines have
requested this requirement, as SMS
and data are the primary services used
by passengers. As for backhaul, Pittick,
explains: On-board satellite transceivers
communicate with satellites/networks
and in turn down to ground-based
transceivers which are then connected
to a mobile network. ip.access has
ensured that the volume of trafc
passed between the base station and
the BSC is kept to an absolute minimum.
Utilising techniques to put all voice calls
into one packet, thereby reducing the
IP overhead and silence suppression for
example, allows for very efcient use
of backhaul bandwidth. Over and above
this, AeroMobile has optimised this again
for its own special market needs and
challenges by further compression of
the voice and signalling and employing
signalling spoong.
Commercial service came with the rst
local approval from the Australian Civil
Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) for a
Qantas 767 in 2007. Emirates followed
in early 2008 with the Boeing 777,
Airbus A330 and A340 with European
Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) approval.
Emirates has now been ying for more
than ve years with over 12 million
mobile devices connecting to our
network, says Little.
AeroMobiles system is increasingly
being charged by operators in the
rest of the world rate for roaming
or less. Some operators offer
extremely attractive roaming rates
as a differentiator especially for their
corporate accounts and business
customers. Arguably, this tactic could
boost loyalty and the habit of usage.
And it isnt all business users; relatively
low-cost Twitter and SMS trafc tempts
a fair number of ordinary users. The
technology, the roaming agreements and
both customer or operator enthusiasm
have not been a problem. Regulation
and certication, however, have been
more challenging. To get to the point
it is at today AeroMobile has had to
obtain approvals for every country that
the system overies. That process is
almost at an end, with only one or two
countries still to open up to mobile
calls on commercial aircraft over their
territory. As for certication, We
started in 2004 and it took us three
years to get EASA approvals, says Little.
Working with our Design Authority
and EASA the key driver was to ensure
that installation and operation of the
system would not affect the safety of
the aircraft.
AeroMobile followed a unique and
ground-breaking process at the time to
obtain certication. In order to prove
that the concept was safe, AeroMobile
completed theoretical calculations
relating to the use of multiple phones
transmitting simultaneously at full power.
We had to prove that in the event
that the on-board system failed all the
phones could theoretically transmit
simultaneously at full power (2 watts)
without causing a safety impact on the
plane, says Little. This was taken to the
worst case by assuming that 512 phones
were all transmitting at the same time
on every seat (plus more). This allowed
us to calculate the theoretical eld
strength within the cabin and avionics
bay. Despite that, in normal operation
the phones are managed to a very low
power level of 1 mW.
Fig.1: A standard installation
on-board a commercial aircraft
Ku/SBB antenna
Leaky feeders
Equipment installation
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CASE STUDY | AeroMobile | GSM in the air: no mere ight of fancy
Then, Little continues, you look at all
the avionic equipment on the aircraft
and nd out the RF susceptibility of
every piece of avionics compared to
the theoretical RF eld generated by
the simultaneous 512 2W phones. A
safety level agreed by EASA allowed
us to determine what avionics would
require individual transmitting personal
electronic device (t-PED) testing.
We used a 32 Watt transmitter to
simulate the RF level generated worst
case by 512 phones transmitting for on-
board t-PED testing so considerably
higher than a single device. The avionics
that required t-PED testing from the
above analysis included on-board
receivers (for example GPS, ILS/VOR,
VHF, DME) along with smoke detectors
and announcement systems. In fact
anything that we thought could be
affected we had to test on the aircraft.
Today all the y-by-wire systems on-
board an aircraft have already been
tested to a very high RF susceptibility
level ensuring that as the plane ies
by high-powered transmitters that the
on-board avionics are not susceptible to
the RF levels. This allowed AeroMobile
to determine the RF susceptibility of all
Critical and Essential avionics on-board
the aircraft. t-PED testing on the rst
type of aircraft took three to four days
a signicant investment by the airline
in downtime. Having eventually satised
EASA, the equipment was classied
on Boeing and Airbus aircraft as no
safety effect. Little adds, however, Not
all aircraft will have been through this
process so our advice to passengers
is always to obey each airlines specic
rules and policies regarding the use of
phones and PEDs in ight.
Having once resisted the concept,
airlines now want GSM connectivity
and are signing up to Ku band and, by
extension, the Panasonic service. Little
says: 2.5G is the base of our product
currently, but as newer aircraft come
online and as the on-board systems get
upgraded I see us transitioning to 3G at
the absolute minimum, if not LTE.
He continues, As with all operators,
we see mobile data as the future of our
business. Together with our partner
Panasonic, AeroMobile is developing
an on-board 3G solution to handle
increasing demand; it will be in service
in 2014.
Still, increasing demand is a nice
problem to have. The service enabled
by AeroMobile and ip.access is gaining
traction at an incredible speed. As Gail
Burlinson, marketing manager with
AeroMobile, says: We have ten airlines
ying with our services on-board,
including some VIP carriers, but more
importantly there will be up to 20 by
the end of the year. In terms of usage
we saw growth of 50 per cent across
all services on our network throughout
2012 and already in 2013 with increased
aircraft installations and passenger
awareness, data usage in January 2013
has already exceeded that of the last six
months of 2012, which is staggering
and demonstrates that when passengers
know theres the option to stay
connected, they will use it!
Underlying this success story is another
one: for small cells, which are going
beyond the home and enterprise in
some very surprising ways. There are
now small cells being deployed not just
in homes, businesses and shopping malls
but at sea and on planes to facilitate
services no other form of cell could
allow.
Pittick says: Extending mobile networks
and providing coverage now knows
no bounds. Areas where we once
assumed it would never be possible
to provide communication have been
accessible. Small cells are now being
increasingly used to provide mobile
services on ships and aircraft, in small
remote communities with no power
or land communications, in homes,
businesses, underground garages, on top
of skyscrapers you name it. And with
that extended access comes extended
opportunities for revenue generation.
Today, thanks to ip.access, AeroMobile
and Panasonic, you can use a regular
GSM or smart phone to roam at 30,000
feet. Operators are clearly convinced
its a good idea. And now that attitudes
to mobile phone use on planes are
changing albeit with a lot of testing
and cooperation from companies like
AeroMobile this market is growing
fast.
In fact mobile calls in-ight may
eventually be not just a luxury for
business users but a necessity for all of
us, one that, like in-ight entertainment
(IFE) could inuence your choice of
carrier. As Little says: From an airlines
perspective we are turning a new
corner where we will see all airlines
having to offer mobile connectivity to
keep up with their competitors.
AeroMobile:
http://www.aeromobile.net
Panasonic Avionics:
http://www.ipaccess.com/en/
femtocells-introduction
ip.access:
http://www.ipaccess.com
Fig.2: ip.access
nanoGSM BTS
FEBRUARY 2013
Where Land & Sea Connect
Marine GSM small cell at-a-glance
GSM solution for marine market
Backhauls to satellite
One picocell per ship serving around 20 users
Commercial launch: April 2009
Technology provided by Globe Wireless &
ip.access
But that small crew is still important, for everything
from cooking, painting and cleaning to engineering,
maintenance and steering ships. And the container-
led boom in global trade means that there are a lot
of ships. The owners of those ships often make a
signicant investment in training, an investment they
hope pays off in long-term staff retention.
However, that isnt always possible. Long periods
at sea and a near total disconnect from the rest of
the world mean that staff churn is a problem: many
crew might join for one leg of a journey and then,
after only a few months of regular isolation, leave.
But it could take very little to keep them on. A
modest perk such as the occasional call home could
boost loyalty signicantly. However, that was not
an option for some time. Kevin Watson, Project
Manager with Globe Wireless, a leading provider
of total solutions in the eld of communications,
operational and IT solutions to the maritime
industry, explains: If a crew member wanted to
make a phone call they had to have direct access
GSM: a global service for maritime!
Todays commercial eets are not the labour-intensive businesses of years ago.
Containerisation has allowed vast volumes of goods to be packed into enormous
shipping containers and to be loaded and unloaded on runners and by crane
into ships of staggering size. No longer do thousands of dockworkers haul
single bags and boxes on to every corner of ships ill-designed for the purpose.
Enormous cargo ships can be manned and maintained by staff numbering only
a few dozen. Even tankers and refrigerator vessels, which also ply their trade in
huge numbers, need only a modest complement of staff to do their job.
CASE STUDY
|

Maritime
CASE STUDY | Globe Wireless | A global service for maritime!
to the handset and satellite terminal on the bridge.
In some cases there would be an extra handset
a crew phone and they had to purchase prepaid
calling cards. They shared that one voice line over
the satellite terminal with the ships business use so
there were restrictions on placing calls. They pretty
much never received a call because the cost to call
a satellite phone from shore using your local telco
is prohibitive.
Integrating regular GSM with satellite would be
a logical response, but for many years it wasnt
possible to have a GSM solution on board a
commercial ship; the satellite terminals just didnt
have the bandwidth. Or it would be too expensive
so the crew wouldnt use it. But older satellite
terminals have been, or are being, replaced by
IP-based satellite terminals, which are faster and
offer higher throughput than their predecessors.
Two of the services that use these modern
terminals are Fleet Broadband from Inmarsat, a
company that provides communication services to a
wide range of business and government customers
on land, at sea and in the air, and OpenPort from
global mobile satellite communications company
Iridium.
Both services use L-band, a band used by satellites
that is in the 1-2GHz frequency range. L-band isnt
ideal for high-speed data but it does have the twin
advantages of working well with smaller antennas
than other satellite bands and experiencing almost
no attenuation problems caused by rain and bad
weather.
Bandwidth may not be at terrestrial network levels;
broadband-type data is pretty much out of the
question. On the other hand, the target market
is not business executives using smartphones and
laptops. Basic connectivity is all the crew require.
Thus a 2G GSM system with a highly optimised link
to satellite backhaul would be ideal.
Enter Globe Wirelesss iFusion communication
system. Globe iFusion integrates a FleetBroadband
250 antenna, a least-cost satellite gateway and a
router. Most importantly perhaps, it offers a GSM
network. Called GlobeMobile, this is a GSM solution
providing crew members with voice calling and SMS
capabilities at reasonable rates. GlobeMobile can
be used not just with Inmarsat FleetBroadband, but
with VSAT and Iridium OpenPort terminals.
Kevin Watson takes up the story. Globe iFusion
contains the below-decks equipment for
FleetBroadband 250. Its all-in-one: you plug it
in, connect it to the network, hook it up to the
antenna and youre ready to go. Then we plug in the
BTS (picocell) that we get from ip.access and that
allows the cell phones to connect.
In this case Globe doesnt send the
voice signal over the voice channel; that
would not be cost-effective. It uses the
signalling and the data channels of the
satellite to communicate with shore and
send the voice signal. That allows us to
send multiple calls through at one time
and to keep the cost down, explains
Watson.
Even though it had been possible to set
up VoIP calling before GlobeMobile, it
was a more complex undertaking and
involved more equipment. End users still
had to pick up a handset at a specic
place on a ship and paid a lot more to
do so. They also had to chat in front of
an audience. Now they are supplied with
a GlobeMobile SIM card and can send
and receive SMS and voice calls from
shore in their cabin, in private.
The business model is fairly
straightforward too. The SIM cards have
a small starter prepaid balance that can
be topped up as required. Its not as
cheap as terrestrial but it offers major
savings on a direct satellite call from the
bridge.
A very important role in this small cell
implementation is played by ip.access,
a major provider of 2G and 3G small
cells. If a ship uses the Globe system
then ip.access supplied the picocells
or rather picocell, since a typical vessel
installation requires only one.
It is relevant in this context that
ip.access focuses entirely on in-building
challenges. This means it has developed
solutions that are easy to deploy,
integrate and scale. Admittedly were
not talking about an ordinary building
here. The ip.access GSM picocell would
normally provide coverage up to a
cell radius of about 300 metres. A ship
is different; the normal ranges dont
apply. Much of the ship is made of thick
metal, which has a real impact on the
signal levels. In fact you might think it
a terrible place to have a base station.
In that case you would be surprised to
learn that, as Mark Pittick, Vice President
Sales Europe, ip.access, explains: It
depends on how the ship is congured.
The corridors act like wave guides: as
the base station is radiating it actually
channels the energy quite efciently
around the ship, often just where you
need it.
If a door is shut, that attenuates the
signal but that is not usually the case.
Watson says: Weve found that if we
place them in stairwells generally
the doorways are left open we can
get about ve decks of coverage from
one of the cells. Theyre usually placed
strategically so that theyre near a crew
common area or near where the crew
has their bunks.
The picocell is unobtrusive: about an
inch deep with a footprint about the
size of an A4 sheet of paper. The size is
ideal for the situation, says Pittick. Not
too big and not too small.
More importantly perhaps, the backhaul
has been highly optimised. We basically
squeeze the voice call into as little
bandwidth as possible, says Pittick. This
is important because satellite backhaul is
very expensive. Optimisation is essential
to allow a relatively low calling rate.
Its not like prepaid services in the
UK, says Pittick, but it is low when
you consider the price compared with
services you can use in remote parts of
the world.
And the customised Globe + ip.access
solution is cost-effective too. Pittick
explains: Its not the sort of solution
that a major operator may choose to
use in its land networks the ip.access
standard solutions address these needs.
But for maritime, aviation or for a
small island network it is ideally suited
because it is a much lower cost than
having to buy products from the macro
vendors.
And the customers are certainly
grateful. On vessels where we offer
GlobeMobile the uptake from the crew
is around 80 per cent, says Watson.
But given the numbers, is that much
of a market? Remember, these are
commercial vessels; the number of crew
isnt as high as it would be on, say, a
cruise vessel. Watson estimates 16-20
users per vessel.
In fact, given the low numbers per
ship the overall usage is pretty
spectacular. Take-up of the GlobeMobile
network has long since passed the
20,000-subscriber mark on well over
1300 vessels. The service continues
to roll out at a steady rate of 50 or
more new ships a month and, with
thousands more out there, has a lot of
potential business waiting, especially
as old satellite terminals are replaced.
Were constantly installing additional
systems for new customers or existing
customers that are upgrading from the
That allows us to send multiple calls
through at one time and to keep the
cost down.
SMALL CELL FORUM Ltd
PO Box 23
Dursley
GL11 5WA UK
t +44 (0)845 644 5823
f +44 (0)845 644 5824
e info@smallcellforum.org
w www.smallcellforum.org
CASE STUDY | Globe Wireless | A global service for maritime!
Its all-in-one: you plug it in, connect it to the network, hook
it up to the antenna and youre ready to go. Then we plug
in the BTS (picocell) that we get from ip.access and that in the BTS (picocell) that we get from ip.access and that
allows the cell phones to connect.
Kevin Watson,
Globe Wireless
old-style satellites to the new ones,
says Watson.
Its not a bad business model for Globe
either. As the only game in town or on
board for GSM users wanting to call
home theres revenue and prot to be
earned. And the end users clearly love
it. We hit a milestone late in 2012 of
a million minutes per month, Watson
says. That was a big deal for us.
It also succeeds in keeping crew loyal
a lot longer and often makes them
into a part-time marketing service.
When they rotate to a new vessel
they are beginning to expect the same
communications service, which is a
word-of-mouth bonus for Globe.
As for the future, the Globe Wireless
and ip.access parts of the network
could easily be enhanced to cope with
more demand but satellites are far less
exible. We have 2G on board now
and that seems best suited for the
satellite terminals and the limitations
we have there as far as bandwidth
and throughput are concerned, says
Watson.
Lets not forget that satellite terminals
were not even digital eight years
ago; modems were the norm. And
bandwidth was much more limited than
it is today. That said, these services will
not remain just in the L-band forever.
New opportunities (being pursued by
Inmarsat among others) exist in the
Ka band where bandwidth is less of an
issue and new satellites are planned. Of
course GlobeMobile is not limited to
L-band. It is already in place on vessels
with Ku and C band, and the company is
ready for Ka.
However, Ka is more vulnerable to rain
fade than the L, C or Ku satellite bands.
That problem is being addressed, but for
the moment, the GlobeMobile service
will remain voice and SMS, which, given
that nothing affordable existed before,
is perfectly acceptable for most crew
members.
However, the compactness of Globes
all-in-one network the MSC, the
SGSN, the HLR everything, essentially,
on one server is a model that Pittick,
for one, feels could be effectively
applied by other companies in other
areas with a little help from ip.access.
As he says: When you look at that
type of architecture you could say that
there is no reason why you cant just
put this solution in a rural village in
Africa, for example, so you could offer
communications for the rst time to
places that had none at all. Mobile
cellular services to the surrounding
village community and long-distance
calls interconnected via satellite are just
the start of new applications for this
model.
Globe Wireless iFusion:
http://www.globewireless.com/
solutions/ifusion
ip.access:
http://www.ipaccess.com
DECEMBER 2012
The Greek mobile market is experiencing signicant
challenges as the economic climate is imposing
pressure on the protability of the countrys
operators. Mobile operators are facing additional
challenges from increased competition, the price
pressure and a market penetration level of 133 per
cent on top of that, they are also experiencing
increasing data trafc volumes.
Although the need for investment in mobile
broadband is no less than in any other western
European market, it is obvious that in a market
like Greece the allocation of capex to mobile
broadband technologies like UMTS900 and LTE is a
key differentiating factor for a mobile operator.
Vodafone Greece has consistently led with its
mobile broadband strategy and is one of just two
operators in Greece currently operating and
deploying LTE networks in urban areas.
Vodafone Greece much like most of Vodafones
subsidiaries has chosen small cells as one of
many tools to maintain a competitive edge. It
started with consumer femtocells and moved to
public-area femtozone services, a move that could
lead to it generating new revenue. Its innovative
project aims to provide for the Greek consumers
growing demand for internet access by establishing
internet usage and free access as a daily commodity.
More specically, it wants to be the rst mobile
provider to set the pace for free internet access in
public places.
Small cells deliver competitive advantage
in tough economic climate
Vodafone Greece, the Greek subsidiary of Vodafone, operates a mobile network
across the country. It is one of the largest mobile operators in Greece and has
formed a strategic partnership with Hellas Online (HOL), a xed-line provider
which offers triple-play services.
CASE STUDY
|
Vodafone Greece
CASE STUDY | Vodafone Greece | Small Cells deliver competitive advantage in tough economic climate
Consumer femtocells: Full Signal
Vodafone Greece launched its consumer femtocell
service in July 2010, the rst of Vodafones
subsidiaries to do so after Vodafone UK.
The service, called Full Signal offers a femtocell
access point to users who need a good mobile
signal in every corner of their house or ofce
even those in basement ats or buildings with
thick walls that can block mobile signals. Vodafone
UK is now using similar branding for its consumer
femtocell, changing its name from Vodafone
Access Gateway to Sure Signal to make sure
that consumers understand what the service
does without the need for more explanation: the
services adverts on national television promote
the benets of the service rather than the technical
properties of the access point.
Vodafone Greeces Full Signal access point currently
retails at 90 (US$117) and is being offered at
discounted prices or free of charge to
contract customers wishing to strengthen their
indoor coverage.
The femtocell service is the rst in
the Greek market and the one with
the highest installed base. Although
Greece may present a somewhat limited
potential for such a service due to a
strong prejudice against cellular masts
the Full Signal service is well accepted
and signicantly improves the customer
experience where used.
Public-area small cells:
location-based services
After establishing its consumer
femtocell service, Vodafone Greece
launched a public area, small cell service
in December 2012 in approximately 200
fast-food restaurants and cafeterias of a
well-known retail chain around Greece.
Importantly, this is the rst hard launch
of small cell zone services based on
location, which may enable a variety of
new business models while enhancing
the user experience.
Vodafone through its partnership with
HOL has opted to provide both 3G
and Wi-Fi access in order to focus on
a free data value proposition rather
than restrict itself to either one of these
technologies. Wi-Fi and femtocells allow
not only smartphones and internet
feature phones, but also notebook
computers and tablets, to be connected
to the network.
Service description
The service, named Free 3G Hotspot,
is deployed in approximately 200
Flocaf cafeterias and Goodys fast-food
restaurants across Greece. By using
a small cell and a directional antenna,
Vodafone Greece is able to create a
new cell that covers the indoor location
of these venues, enabling its network to
handle trafc generated in these areas
differently. The user experience when
entering these areas is described below
(see also g. 1).
As soon as the customer device is
camped to the small cell, all trafc
through the small cell is whitelisted and
does not count towards the subscribers
monthly allowance. An SMS notication
is sent after ve minutes to alert the
Vodafone Greece has launched a cost
effective zone-based service driven by
small cells
Source:
Vodafone
Greece
Fig. 1: Vodafones Free 3G Hotspot: internet service ow at
customer entry and departure from small cell coverage
Vodafone
subscriber
enters venue
Indoor Cell-ID
triggers location-
based service
Vodafone
subscriber
leaves venue
Macro Cell-ID
triggers normal
service
Handover to small cell
Handover to macro cell
5 minute delay
3 minute delay
SMS with
service details is
sent to handset
Macro Cell-ID
triggers normal
service
SMALL CELL FORUM Ltd
PO Box 23
Dursley
GL11 5WA UK
t +44 (0)845 644 5823
f +44 (0)845 644 5824
e info@smallcellforum.org
w www.smallcellforum.org
CASE STUDY | Vodafone Greece | Small Cells deliver competitive advantage in tough economic climate
The new location-based service from Vodafone Greece has
the potential to attract mass market interest
user about the service; this delay was
implemented to avoid sending the
SMS to customers who do not intend
to remain in the Free 3G Hotspot
coverage area of the restaurant/caf. In
a similar fashion, an SMS is sent when
the user leaves the coverage area of the
small cell but with a shorter delay.
Vodafone Greece has also launched an
Android app to notify subscribers in real
time when they enter or leave a Free
3G Hotspot: the app monitors the ID of
the cell that the handset is connected
to and noties the user. The majority
of user reviews in Androids Google
Play store are positive, suggesting that
users perceive the service in a positive
way and understand the benets of
connecting to the small cell.
So to summarise, Vodafone Greece
has launched a zone-based service
driven by a small cell as well as an
Android app that can be used for
value-added services.
Deployment drivers
The deployment drivers for Vodafones
Free 3G Hotspot are rst and foremost
aimed at establishing internet usage and
free access as a daily commodity. The
competitive and nancially challenging
environment in Greece does not allow
much exibility for mobile operators
to launch new services but Vodafone
Greece has created a relatively cost-
effective new location-based service
that has the potential to attract mass-
market interest. It is a service that
could, in the future, potentially provide
new revenue opportunities by offering
advertising options to venue owners
through Android apps or other
location-based services.
Vodafone Greece
http://www.vodafone.gr/
This case study was originally published in Informas
Small Cell Market Status report, Q4 2012. Reproduced with kind
permission of Informa Telecoms & Media.
MARCH 2013
Private GSM at-a-glance
Private GSM solution for the municipality of
Zaanstad in the Netherlands.
Internal enterprise network including PBX
integration, edge-based mobile network
software and 41 GSM small cells serving up to
1500 employees.
Connects to PSTN and enterprise voice and
data network. Roams onto macro.
Launch: November 2011.
Technology provided by Dimension Data,
Quortus, ip.access and Private Mobility.
This radical reappraisal meant that the majority of
municipality ofcials would have no xed workplace;
staff, when entering the building, would nd
themselves a place to work. And only members of
the customer contact centre and the secretarial
staff would have a landline. The rest of the staff
would be given a choice of smartphones.
But these smartphones were not going to get most
of their use on macro networks. The City Hall was
to have a new telephony infrastructure bringing
small cells to an unusual enterprise application a
private mobile network that would allow the 1500
or so City Hall staff to work and be contactable at
any one of 1050 workstations or anywhere else in
the building.
Specialist IT services and solutions provider
Dimension Data was the system integrator for
the project the designing and building of a
private GSM network fully integrated with an IP
telephony-based communications platform, bringing
Unied Communication functionality to employee
smartphones. When employees are working outside
the building, they are also reachable and may simply
roam between the private GSM network and the
public network.
Small cells in the enterprise:
private GSM comes to City Hall
When the municipality of Zaanstad in the Netherlands brought together
services previously housed in three locations in its stunning new City Hall,
it decided it also needed a new, more effective, more efcient approach to
working within the building.
CASE STUDY
|

City of Zaanstad
CASE STUDY | City of Zaanstad | Small cells in the enterprise: private GSM comes to City Hall
This isnt the only important advantage of private
GSM. This approach also provides a robust
environment, with fewer access points being
needed than with a DECT or Wi-Fi network. With
a private GSM environment employees experience
the benets of proven GSM technology, but they
are not dependent on the public GSM network,
over which the municipality has no control and
which may become congested at times.
An important part of the IP telephony solution is
the PBX: an Avaya Aura Contact Centre system,
which handles all incoming calls to the main
number that citizens and businesses use to direct
their questions to the municipality authorities.
Small cells were also part of the network:
Dimension Data sourced the 41 picocells from
ip.access. The private GSM network technology
came from another UK company, Quortus, and
the Dutch company Private Mobility provided the
roaming interconnect with the macro network.
Together, these technologies brought together
normal voice, text and packet data services with
advanced PBX functionality.
This approach to encouraging worker exibility
isnt necessarily a cheap option. Not just the
infrastructure and software costs but training
employees and explaining to them how the
system works are a major investment. The longer-
term gains are a clear attraction of the scheme,
however; quicker response times, greater customer
satisfaction and greater exibility, efciency and
employee availability will, eventually, generate
savings that should more than offset the original
investment.
Certainly, after a settling in and training period
the workforce has now embraced the concept.
However, the network had to deliver on a technical
level too. And thats where the partners in the
project came in. Partners like Quortus, which
offers operators the capability to embed full core
network functionality into cost-effective software
applications deployable at small cell sites. This
means that advanced network features like data
ofoad, session creation, switching and handoff,
trafc compression, edge caching and presence
information can be handled at the edge.
In the context of the city of Zaanstad, the Quortus
SoftCore Connect architecture was used. This is
described as providing a scalable way to deploy
both GSM and 3G radio networks in enterprise
networks combining easy integration with
enterprise IP PBX systems and direct access from
mobile devices to local LAN data servers.
Much of which was relevant to this
project. However, there were a couple
of differences from much of the
companys previous work. Firstly, this
was big: one of the biggest projects of its
type undertaken in Europe, in fact. And
secondly, the operator wasnt actually
a traditional operator. Control of the
network, at least inside the building, was
in the hands of the City Hall.
So why the private GSM approach to
small cell deployment? In fact, the logic
is fairly straightforward. Whereas in the
residential market leaving your small
cell takes you back on the macro, in the
enterprise you can burden the real core
handing from cell to cell as you walk
down a corridor. In Zaanstad City Hall,
when a call is made on the move all the
audio, the mobility and the handover
control as you walk down the corridors
past the ip.access picocells is dealt with
locally. A lot of backhaul is saved because
of the local switching of the voice and
data too. The macro network is in any
case, unaware of it.
You also get the advantage of a mobile
network, with added capacity, coverage
and control, because you have proper
integration with the enterprise voice
network, in this case via an Avaya PBX.
Andy Odgers, CEO of Quortus, explains:
In this new environment, the GSM or
3G handset is effectively an extension of
the Avaya PBX; our software integrates
the handset into the enterprise voice
network. There is a Quortus-supplied
local core in the enterprise which
models for these phones as if they were
SIP clients (or SIP phones) hanging
off the Avaya PBX. Thus they can have
almost all the features of a PBX, which,
Odgers argues, is where features ought
to be. They shouldnt be in the MSC
sitting outside if you are meant to be
part of an enterprise voice network.
Users ought to be able to leverage
the much more feature-rich Avaya
or Nortel or Cisco or similar core
manager: one of these advanced class
5 SIP servers that have a wide range of
advanced enterprise oriented features.
Among such features are those allowing
your GSM or 3G handset GSM in this
case to be part of hunt groups, to be
part of dual ringing, to access click-
to-dial, or IM pop-ups, or short code
dialling, or pick-up calls, or dial zero for
the receptionist in fact, all the things
you nd in modern PBXs you can now
use from your GSM handset. In the
Zaanstad system you can also access
the intranet directly, as well as the
internet on the local LAN and internal
IT services.
At the same time, there are still the
capabilities of a regular GSM phone
service from the macro network: voice,
SMS, secure user authentication and
packet data. Also, unlike DECT, say, when
you leave the building you go onto the
macro network.
You could argue that this system is
bringing some reality to endlessly
predicted trends like bring your own
device (BYOD). The reason is that here
there is no proprietary SIP client to
download. You can use almost all the
features of the SIP network the Avaya
in this case on any handset, smart or
not. Importantly too, even when you
are outside the building and back on
the macro network you still have short
code dialling and many other facilities of
the PBX. The user experience does not
radically change. This was a deliberate
part of the planning from the start.
It certainly brings new meaning to
another over-used term: this really is
hot desking. Employees no longer have
to log on or log out of a workstation.
However, they can always be found. If
you are, for example, part of a planning
department hunt group the PBX will
ring round to nd someone to answer
a call sequentially. Whether youre on a
desk phone or your mobile at home
or on the street you can be contacted.
Private GSM is a useful way of taking
whats best from a mobile network
while ofoading the actual trafc from
the macro. But also, by making it internal
and linked to the PSTN via the PBX,
it gives the City Hall more capacity,
resilience and, of course more control
over what is after all, its own, private
network.
And that gives the City Hall numerous
options, many of which it is only just
beginning to explore. Take, for example,
the security guard at the front desk
of the building. He has a web screen
that is linked to the communications
system. When someone needs rst aid,
the guard puts the message on the web
screen. That rings or texts the phones of
predetermined rst aiders who can then
all run to wherever theyre supposed to
go. All this happens independently of the
macro network.
In this new environment, the GSM or
3G handset is effectively an extension of
the Avaya PBX; our software integrates
the handset into the enterprise voice
network.
SMALL CELL FORUM Ltd
PO Box 23
Dursley
GL11 5WA UK
t +44 (0)845 644 5823
f +44 (0)845 644 5824
e info@smallcellforum.org
w www.smallcellforum.org
CASE STUDY | City of Zaanstad | Small cells in the enterprise: private GSM comes to City Hall
In the past when we talked about FMC there was no real
convergence Here you really are part of the enterprise
voice network. The convergence here is happening where it voice network. The convergence here is happening where it
should be.
Andy Odgers,
CEO, Quortus
That small cell community doesnt just
benet the City Hall. Many employees
today reach for their mobile phones
when at their desks because its easier
and because that is where their address
book tends to be. They then grumble
about paying mobile rates. However, on
this GSM network, if they make PSTN
calls in the building it just goes out over
the PBX.
It sounds impressive. Why, therefore is
it not more common? That is, in part
answered by another question: if the
Quortus software supports 3G
small cells too, using an embedded
Iuh femto-gateway, why is this a 2G/2.5G
GSM system?
In fact the Netherlands is a slightly
special case; it has opened up some of
its GSM 1800MHz spectrum so anybody
can transmit, given a modest outlay.
Not all countries even where such
relaxing of otherwise typically stringent
spectrum regulations is in place, have
been quite so efcient at spreading the
benets. However, this doesnt yet apply
to 3G in the Netherlands unfortunately.
The City of Zaanstad municipality is
clearly pleased with its new network in
its City Hall and because of its high
prole in the Netherlands, town halls
and corporates have been watching
the outcome with interest, as have
system integrators and established
mobile operators. However, working
with this model may require some skills
extension for operators in particular.
For an operator to work directly with
enterprise networks would require
some new and possibly less familiar
capabilities: private network installation,
radio planning, PBX integration and
extended CPE maintenance, for
example. But many operators are
looking at it as a way of securing
footprint within the lucrative enterprise
and corporate sectors. The Zaanstad
project could be seen as a sort of test
bed: a good reference to help deal with
the questions that operators need
answered questions of ownership
between the operator and the
enterprise, say. However, says Odgers,
there is more and more interest from
operators and system integrators so I
think it will happen.
And when it does, it might signal a
revival of another overused and
even mocked concept: xed mobile
convergence. In the past when we
talked about FMC there was no real
convergence, says Odgers. All that
often meant was that you were on a
cell long-lined inside the enterprise. The
behaviour was just the same as if you
were outside. Here you really are part
of the enterprise voice network. The
convergence here is happening where it
should be.
Source: FrameWeb.com
City of Zaanstad:
http://www.zaanstad.nl/
Dimension Data:
http://www.dimensiondata.com
Private Mobility:
http://www.privatemobility.nl/
Quortus:
http://www.quortus.com
ip.access:
http://www.ipaccess.com
FEBRUARY 2012
Full Dekning at-a-glance
Enterprise femtocell deployment
Integrated with xed-line replacement solution
SON and femtocell-femtocell handover
Plug n play to existing LAN installation
Trialed in 2010
Full commercial launch Q1 2011
Technology providers Ubiquisys and NEC
Network Norway has made its name by being
different. Like many challenger brands, it operates
in a highly competitive environment. In the case
of Norways third operator, that means competing
with two incumbents that have both xed and
wireless assets, and between them account for
more than 80% of the total available market.
So it should come as no surprise that the company
has been at the forefront in using new technologies
such as small cells to differentiate itself. Having
conducted extensive user trials in 2010, Network
Norway began offering enterprise femtocells to its
customers on a commercial basis in Q1 2011. The
service, which is based on self-organizing femtocell
access points from Ubiquisys and gateways from
NEC, has been an unqualied success.
Network Norway has built rapid growth by
focusing on business customers, and on the back
of a dramatic trend in Norway towards mobile,
rather than xed, telephony. In 2007 the company
How Network Norway is utilising small
cells to change the world of business
Successful small cell deployments around the world have established the
technologys effectiveness in a residential context. But small cells can also
dramatically change the world of business communications. This case history
outlines how Network Norway has combined a new self-organizing femtocell
product (Full Dekning, or full coverage) with its Mobile Centrex offering, to
create a complete turnkey xed line replacement solution for small to medium
sized enterprises (SMEs).
CASE STUDY
|

Network Norway
CASE STUDY | Network Norway | How Network Norway is utilising small cells to change the world of business
was a retail operation with just four outlets. Since
becoming a mobile operator in 2009 it has built
18% market share in Norway, with a national
distribution network of around 100 B2B dealers,
concentrated particularly on serving the needs of
small to medium enterprise (SMEs).
Mobile in Norway is making rapid inroads at the
expense of xed line communications. The market
in Norway is going mobile only, says Geir Ove
Jenssen, who heads up the Network Norway
femtocell operation. In 2010, 64% of all call minutes
originated on a mobile phone. But an even higher
proportion 79% of call minutes terminated on a
mobile.
Fixed line subscriber numbers have been falling
year-on-year for a considerable time now, in
both the residential and enterprise markets,
according to gures from the Norwegian Post and
Telecommunications Authority. The rate of change
was about 3% up until 2007, says Jenssen. But since
then, he explains, the decline has accelerated. Fixed
network subscriptions dropped 10% year-on-year
from 1H 2009 to the comparable period in 2010,
he says. And this trend is not restricted to POTS
lines. Fixed IP-telephony is also declining.
Why is this happening? Jenssen is in no doubt that,
at least in the enterprise sector, the motivation
is simplication and cost reduction. The mobile
can replace the xed line service, but the same is
not true in reverse, he explains. So if companies
are looking to rationalize by employing a single
integrated service, mobile is the only way that
makes sense.
Network Norway is driving this change via its
Mobile Centrex offering, which allows businesses
and SMEs in particular to trade their xed
line PBX for a virtual mobile exchange whose
functionality is integrated into the network.
Mobile Centrex gives Network Norways enterprise
customers all of the facilities that they would expect
from a sophisticated business communications
system, such as short dialing, conferencing, hunt
groups, personal groups and call queueing, including
VIP handling. There is also a PC switchboard
application installation for the attendant, as well
as a smartphone app for user control, statistics on
attendant function and user dened voice prompts.
In addition, the system brings integration benets.
The most obvious of these is that each member of
staff has a single phone number, while callers still
have the choice of calling a switchboard number if
they so wish. Companies also save PBX costs and
expensive service agreement fees.
But the Mobile Centrex approach has
one potential pitfall: dependency on the
mobile phone is 100%. In an enterprise
environment, every missed call might be
a missed business opportunity. Business
users are therefore demanding; they will
not tolerate dropped calls or a service
that does not deliver to the promised
level of reliability.
The need to provide absolute reliability
especially at the customers own
site represents a challenge. Although
cellular coverage in Norway is generally
excellent, building regulations are
extremely stringent. As a result, ofce
and industrial units are frequently
constructed with steel or concrete walls
and metal layer windows, making it very
difcult to achieve indoor coverage with
macrocells from the outside in.
The problem worsens as smartphones
proliferate: it is harder to build indoor
coverage with 3G than with 2G. And
although many enterprise customers
are located in clusters, for instance
on industrial parks, it is generally
not practical to rely on deploying a
supplementary macrocell base station
whenever a customer experiences
indoor coverage problems.
The femtocell is the commercial
answer to these problems, says
Geir Ove Jenssen. Network Norway
has combined the Mobile Centrex
solution with a femtocell offering
branded Full Dekning (literally full
coverage), to create a seamless
enterprise service with 100% coverage
indoors, in a cost effective deployment
with low equipment cost and
straightforward deployment.
Simplicity is the watchword for the
service. Installation, which is performed
by Network Norways dealer network,
is highly automated; no more complex,
according to Jenssen, than installing
Wi-Fi access points. Pricing is simple,
with a monthly cost to the customer
of 12.50 per femtocell over a
24 month contract, and no initial set-up
fee. At these price levels, the service
is economic only because it does not
require the complex and costly cellular
network planning needed by traditional
indoor coverage solutions.
The service which was the rst
femtocell offering in Scandinavia was
launched with a major marketing push,
including advertising in national and
regional newspapers, the business
press, and billboard slots at Norways
major airports. The campaign focused
on several different segments. Many
potential customers will consider the
switch to exclusively cellular working
only if they receive a service-level
guarantee, and the femtocell offering is
key to that capability.
Full Dekning also allows dealers to help
customers that have little or no mobile
coverage in an existing workplace,
or which are expanding. Customers
moving to a new facility also value the
service, as do those in the process of
switching from 2G to 3G handsets, and
experiencing a subjective degradation
in indoor coverage. Finally, Full Dekning
also allows Network Norway to
take care of companies that have
home-working employees with bad
coverage at home.
As we have seen, the service relies
heavily on technology and automation.
Dealers are provided with an online
order processing and tracking system
that automatically works with
Network Norways back-end
systems such as billing and CRM,
and communicates directly with the
centralized storage and logistics system
to fulll hardware orders.
Although the service is dealer-installed,
Network Norway imposed rigorous
requirements to simplify the installation
process and produce an end-to-end
zero touch capability. The Ubiquisys
access points are congured in open
access mode and make extensive use
of self-organizing network (SON)
technology to provide landline-quality
coverage. The use of SON is particularly
important for the SMEs targeted by
Network Norway, which tend to occupy
mixed use buildings on industrial and
retail parks, with extensive use of steel
construction, few windows and an
awkward mix of ofce and production/
warehouse spaces.
The femtocells communicate via the
customers LAN without the need for a
central controller node, and implement
femtocell-to-femtocell hand-off, allowing
several access points to be used to
achieve coverage throughout a large
facility, without the danger of dropped
calls when users move around. When
rst powered-up, the femtocells
self-congure, establishing basic
connectivity with the core network, and
downloading any required conguration
parameters and software.
If companies are looking to rationalize
by employing a single integrated service,
mobile is the only way that makes sense.
Customers want to communicate with a
person, not a company.
SMALL CELL FORUM Ltd
PO Box 23
Dursley
GL11 5WA UK
t +44 (0)845 644 5823
f +44 (0)845 644 5824
e info@smallcellforum.org
w www.smallcellforum.org
CASE STUDY | Network Norway | How Network Norway is utilising small cells to change the world of business
The femtocell offering allows companies to take care of
their communications needs simply and effectively not
only for employees at the central ofce or factory, but also
those who are on the move and those who work at home.
Geir Ove
Jenssen,
Network
Norway.
The same self-organizing network
(SON) capabilities allow the femtocells
to self-optimize in real time on an on-
going basis, adjusting their power level
and neighbour list based on base station
output. The network is also self-healing:
if a femtocell is moved, there is a power
failure or some other kind of fault, the
surrounding femtocells automatically
recongure to compensate.
The high level of self-organization
and automation still leaves plenty
of scope for dealers to add value.
Before installation, they need to obtain
physical oor plans and establish the
capacity needs in each area. It is also
vital to ensure that the customer
has sufcient throughput in the xed
broadband connection that will be
used for backhaul both in the uplink
and downlink.
The dealer also takes responsibility
for a simple level of network planning
to ensure coverage, similar to what
would be required when installing an
enterprise Wi-Fi system. The intention is
to create overlapping coverage areas to
allow handover, while paying attention
to challenging spots such as doors,
enclosed staircases and sharp corners.
Jenssen says that in this respect the
femtocell solution is a far cry from
the systems that have traditionally
been used to solve indoor coverage
problems. Such systems require
specialist equipment and an expert radio
engineering project to implement. Our
solution delivers high quality indoor
mobile coverage in any size or shape
of building with no radio engineering
and no local controller to drive up
the cost, he explains. Its enterprise
mobility made simple just plug in some
femtocells to your existing LAN and
within minutes you have a complete high
performance 3G HSPA network.
The dealer attends on site to support
the customer in the installation process,
and performs static and moving tests to
ensure that coverage is adequate and
handover is occurring effectively.
After-sales support uses existing
processes and is provided in three lines,
rst by the dealer and/or Network
Norway customer service, then by
Network Norway tech support, and
nally at engineer/product level.
According to Jenssen, customers are
impressed with the quality of the
service. Customers that have poor
macro network coverage clearly
perceive femtocells as delivering good
quality on key parameters such as
coverage, capacity and speech quality,
he says. More than three-quarters of
those involved in Network Norways
2010 friendly user trials refused to
return their femtocells, while 100% said
that coverage was improved.
Jenssen is also impressed with the state
of the technology. SON is vital, he says,
particularly when trying to address
customers in bigger, more complex
buildings with many users. And from
the dealers point of view, the ability to
provide a highly differentiated offering
is valuable. They consider femtocells
a tool to attract and retain customers
to mobile solutions and to Network
Norway in particular, he explains.
Customers perceive the dealers as able
to handle femtocell installations, and
provide good support.
The bottom line, says Jenssen, is that
the femtocell offering allows companies
to take care of their communications
needs simply and effectively not only
for employees at the central ofce or
factory, but also those who are on the
move and those who work at home.
Now, he says, no customer is out
of reach.
Network Norway
http://www.networknorway.no/
Tjenester/Full_dekning
Ubiquisys
http://www.ubiquisys.com/femtocell-
media-press-releases-id-250.htm
FEBRUARY 2012
3G Microcell at-a-glance
Mass market femtocell deployment
Zero-touch provisioning
Soft launch in eight locations September 2009
Commercial launch June 2010
Distributed through ATTs 2,200 outlets
Technology provided by Cisco & ip.access
AT&Ts 3G MicroCell is pretty magical: just one
of the recent tweets you can read about the USs
best-known femtocell offering to date. The AT&T
Microcell service combines the latest gadgetry
courtesy of technology providers Cisco and
ip.access with some slick marketing, advanced
network management, and an understanding of
customer needs that is second-to-none.
The MicroCell proposition is simplicity itself. The
marketing message is simple: its all about ve-bar
indoor coverage. The customer experience is also
simple: the MicroCell just works out of the box.
But, as is so often the case, a great deal of
technology, expertise and hard work has gone into
creating that simple user experience.
AT&T launched the Microcell service commercially
in September 2009 in eight locations, including
cities in North and South Carolina and Georgia, in
Las Vegas, and San Diego. The UMTS-based femtocell
access point the rst 3G femtocell to be launched
in the US supports four simultaneous users with
both data and voice services, in closed mode:
the user can specify a white list of authorised
cellphones at the point of purchase, and manage the
list subsequently online.
For this initial soft launch, AT&T chose a one-off
purchase price for the femtocell of $149.99, but by
offering a $49.99 rebate for customers who also
used AT&T broadband, and a further $100 rebate
for cellular customers taking a $19.99 unlimited
voice minutes femtozone tariff, the company
effectively made it possible to acquire a femtocell
free of charge.
Having successfully proved and rened the
service commercially in the September 2009
pre-launch, the Microcell was rolled out nationwide
in June 2010.
Zero touch has a big impact for AT&T
AT&T has done more than perhaps any other operator to familiarise consumers
with the idea of a femtocell. But the simple proposition that consumers nd
so attractive is made possible only by some sophisticated technology and a
consummate customer service operation. The Small Cell Forum looks at the
history of the service that AT&T calls the MicroCell
CASE STUDY
|

AT&T
CASE STUDY | AT&T | Zero touch has a big impact for AT&T
The 2009 soft launch provided the Microcell team
with an opportunity to ne-tune all aspects of the
service an opportunity that proved key when
the time came for national roll-out. Its all about
ensuring that its simple for the end user, said
Gordon Manseld, AT&Ts executive director for
radio access network delivery.
According to Jim Tavares, Ciscos Director of
Strategy and Business Development, one of
the central goals was to minimise the need for
customers to call AT&T customer care when they
were installing the femtocells. In a zero touch
experience, he explains, no communication is
required with carrier customer care for device use.
And supporting a zero touch approach lies at the
heart of sustainable scale.
The roll-out team realised that speeding this
zero-touch provisioning ow would be the key
to deploying femtocells after all, AT&T has 100
million subscribers, and if even a small percentage of
these purchased a femtocell, this would represent
a substantial provisioning task. The process itself
was to be extremely simple (theres that word
again!). First, the system would acquire the critical
subscriber information: the proposed device
location and the white list of subscribers. Then, once
at home, the subscriber would plug the Ethernet
and power connections into the femtocell access
point, and the device would become operational.
Achieving this degree of automation required
quality hardware, an integrated backend software
system, and much more. AT&T intended to sell
the Microcell through its own stores. And with
around 2,200 company-owned retail outlets, of
which 700 are ofcially bilingual, the company soon
realised that training store staff in advance of the
national launch was a high priority. They would be
at the forefront of ensuring potential customers
understood the most fundamental conditions for
owning a femtocell: they would need to be a 3G
subscriber, have inadequate macro coverage at
home, and possess a broadband connection of
sufcient quality.
To back up the work of the retail staff, AT&T built
a sophisticated web portal, that acts both as a
pre-sales information resource for customers and
as an account management tool, allowing end-users
to perform tasks such as conguring their white list
of authorized users. The site makes extensive use
of videos, not just to demonstrate the benets of
owning a Microcell, but also to ensure that potential
customers knew what to expect when they brought
their hardware home for the rst time.
Of course the heart of the offering
is the femtocell itself. The device is
distinctively styled, with particular
attention given to the industrial and
interface design aspects. The latter
consists of just ve LED indicators,
vital details in the push for zero
touch. These indicators a power
light, an Ethernet light, a GPS light, a
computer light (to indicate an active
state, for instance that data transfer
is taking place) and a 3G light serve
a dual purpose. First, they must tell
the consumer everything s/he needs
to know about what the box is doing,
both during conguration and in-use;
second, they allow support centre
staff to troubleshoot any conguration
problems over the telephone.
Other ner points in the integrated
deployment operation include the
provision of a highly polished
quick-start/user guide, and a system of
intuitive feedback telling the customer
that installation has been successful.
At the smartphone, an automated SMS
conrms femtocell activation, and an
on-screen alpha-tag (reading AT&T
Microcell) shows when the handset is
connected to the femtocell.
Early adopters praised the set-up
process. Darren Murph at Engadget said:
Initial setup was a breeze; you simply
head to AT&Ts setup website, login
to your AT&T account, punch in your
devices serial number and then add or
delete AT&T mobile numbers that can
be used on the device. Got a friend that
comes over often and likes to make
calls? Adding him / her is no problem,
and numbers can be added or deleted at
any time after the initial setup, too.
According to Jim Tavares, making the
public face of the Microcell that simple
required attention to a host of ne
detail behind the scenes, much of which
centered around ensuring that the
network could locate each femtocell
accurately. The systems (within existing
networks) arent dened to allow base
stations to move, he says. A femtocell
device can be utilised anywhere.
Integration is required with key carrier
billing, RF planning and regulatory IT
systems.
From the billing point of view, each
cell site needs to be integrated with
local and regional billing plans. This is
generally achieved with reference to
the Cell ID and service area identier
(SAI) code.
In terms of RF planning, the femtocell
needs to work in harmony with the
existing macro network, and determine
local requirements for parameters
like its own carrier frequency, power
level and so on. Tavares says that it
was important that the provisioning
system should provide maximum
exibility and automation in order to
set the femtocells parameters. Cisco
effectively wrapped the provisioning
system around the radio, reducing the
adaptability burden placed on the radio
layer itself.
Finally, the regulatory system in North
America requires that accurate cell site
location be available to allow
emergency E911 systems to work,
and to permit lawful intercept by
enforcement agencies. Part of the
solution to all of these requirements
was a location verication toolbox
that combines GPS with network
listen and subscriber information. The
Microcell itself includes a GPS receiver,
but eld testing showed that GPS alone
would not be sufcient to reliably locate
each unit. The system therefore uses
the carrier network as a source of local
information: the femtocell congures
itself to listen out for adjacent cells.
The resulting data is combined with the
subscriber-reported street address and
information from the built-in GPS, to
give AT&T a robust x on the location
of any particular femtocell.
The femtocell application talks to the
carrier network at a variety of levels.
In some cases the communication is
standards-based for instance the radio
interfaces are standards-compliant.
But other systems, such as billing and
provisioning, as for most carriers, are
proprietary. The femtocell application
itself needs to exchange and act on
information from the carrier
network to manage the assignment of
the femtocell to local gateways
and provisioning elements. It then
reports back through those elements
on how it has congured itself, and
monitors information such as its
registration status.
The Microcell was launched against
a backdrop of high expectation,
underpinned with not a little scepticism.
In particular, some commentators were
convinced that the femtocells would
create interference problems. The truth
was that, again with careful management,
femtocells in the network actually
improved matters substantially.
Its all about ensuring that its simple for
the end user.
SMALL CELL FORUM Ltd
PO Box 23
Dursley
GL11 5WA UK
t +44 (0)845 644 5823
f +44 (0)845 644 5824
e info@smallcellforum.org
w www.smallcellforum.org
CASE STUDY | AT&T | Zero touch has a big impact for AT&T
Interference isnt a problem. We have tested femtocells
extensively in real customer deployments of many
thousands of femtocells, and we nd that the mitigation
techniques implemented successfully minimise and avoid
interference. The more femtocells you deploy, the more
uplink interference is reduced.
Gordon
Manseld,
AT&T
Speaking in March 2010, Gordon
Manseld was already condent enough
to say: We have deployed femtocells
co-carrier with both the hopping
channels for GSM macrocells and
with UMTS macrocells. Interference
isnt a problem. We have tested
femtocells extensively in real customer
deployments of many thousands
of femtocells, and we nd that the
mitigation techniques implemented
successfully minimise and avoid
interference. The more femtocells you
deploy, the more uplink interference
is reduced.
The main reason behind this
improvement is the fact that a
cellphone (or other connected device)
communicating with a nearby femtocell
transmits at a much lower power than if
it were communicating via a far-distant
cell tower. The presence of the femtocell
therefore substantially reduces uplink
interference for all users. This reduced
interference improves service quality
and data speeds not only for the
femtocell user, but also for all other
customers trying to make a connection
via the same macrocell.
There are already hundreds of
thousands of AT&T Microcell access
points already in the eld. As we move
into a world of HetNets and small cells,
the zero touch principles pioneered by
AT&T, Cisco and ip.access look likely to
have had a major impact on the shape of
networks for some time to come.
AT&T landing page:
http://www.att.com/shop/
wireless/devices/3gmicrocell.
jsp?fbid=m1Acq2-WAeA
Cisco solutions page
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/
solutions/ns341/ns973/att_
microcell.html
ip.access solutions page
http://www.ipaccess.com/en/
femtocells-introduction