Enter The 'Attocell' To Reduce Travelers’ Mobile Fees

The femtocell is finding its way into a host of different formats, and the latest even comes with its own new name, the 'attocell'. Developed by UK femto maker Ubiquisys, this allows travelers to bypass international roaming charges without resorting to Skype, by working with a 3G handset.

Focal Points:

• The device is plugged via USB into a laptop or other device with internet access and then acts as a tiny personal base station for the user's handset. It was developed initially for the iPhone but can work with any 3G phone, and has been tested with models running Android, Symbian and BlackBerry, said the supplier.
• The attocell connects relays phone calls and mobile web access via the laptop's connection, and uses the same signaling as Ubiquisys' more conventional indoor femtocells to talk to the 3G carrier network. It also borrows the femto's methods for monitoring its surrounding radio environment to avoid interference with the macro network.
• Since it is designed for business travelers, the device also needs to analyze the environment to configure radio power to the locally permitted level. This will determine the transmitter's range, which could vary from a few millimeters, requiring the phone to be placed on the attocell, to several meters.

Operators are always looking for ways to add value to their services, especially for lucrative user groups such as business travelers, and also for techniques that could lure customers away from over the top applications like Skype. So offering attocells will have an obvious appeal, despite the potential impact on roaming fees, which are increasingly bypassed by subscribers anyway, using Wi-Fi and Skype. Ubiquisys says it is in talks with a range of as-yet unnamed carriers.