The Swindon, UK-based company recently announced closure of its $12m Series A funding round, which CEO Chris Gilbert said was sufficient to take through to next year when it plans technical trials of its ZoneGate access point in the first quarter and commercial trials in the second.
Gilbert said both sets will use the first version of the device codenamed G1, with a G2 version as the actual production model, which is scheduled to appear in the third quarter of 2007.
To date the company has announced the provider of its baseband silicon, PicoChip Designs Ltd, and is on the cusp of unveiling the names of its RF chip suppliers and the hardware vendor that will actually make the production model on the company’s behalf.
While UbiquiSys refers to its device as an access point, its competitor IP.access Ltd calls its femto3G product a 3G base station for the residential market, which is indicative of how the space is still emerging. Femtocell technology enables up to four mobile phones in a household environment to route their calls over a DSL line, with their network operator offering them fixed-line calling rates when they are in their homezone.
It is similar to what UMA offers, and what IMS promises, as and when carriers implement the latter in the core of their networks. In terms of UMA, however, there are significant differences, in that it works by deploying a software client on a GSM handset, then runs its voice traffic through an encrypted tunnel across a WiFi router on to a DSL link then to a network controller (called a UNC or GANC), from where it is forwarded to the destination phone number. IMS, when it is in operation, will enable FMC too, and while it doesn’t rely on WiFi, it still needs a client to be on the phone.
Gilbert said he sees market opportunities for femtocell technology in both camps, since the ZoneGate device can house the UMA client. The Achilles heel of UMA is the client and WiFi, he said, in that any carrier wanting to offer it today has to provision the handsets with the client preloaded and configured, while the customer needs the WiFi AP. He said putting the client in the ZoneGate and access that device over a regular cellular link therefore will simplify the process, and when IMS networks come along, the same will be true for the IMS client.
Beyond that, he said there are other benefits from femtocell technology. First, traffic will be able to kept local, so that, for instance, if someone requests access to say the CNN web site, instead of the request having to go all the way to the core of the mobile carrier’s network then back out, it will be able to serve up the web page locally. This would enable them to offload the macro network, said Gilbert. Second, there is the potential for the ZoneGate to have its own phone number, from which each of the mobile phones in the house could operate as an extension of it while in range, effectively replacing the cordless phone function.
