Tech predictions - convergence

On January 12 I had predicted that Internet convergence gateway announced by Cisco will have femto cell functionality. Guess what, there is a news at EE Times today: Cisco invests in femto cell pioneer ip.access.

Convergance--new mantra

Femto cells, the saviors for telecom service provider companies provide convergence between the mobile wireless world and public Internet for efficient delivery of voice and data contents.

Last week Cisco delved on how TV (read multimedia content) and Internet convergence gateways will help telecom companies transform into experience providers (up in value chain).

People are now thinking of adding many other services to such a gateway that can be delivered digitally. It won't be a surprise if such a gateway will also have femto cells as one of the many functionalities it will offer.

So why haven't companies thought of such, what Bob McIntyre calls a super computer for visual networking (I would rather call it as media or experience networking), device before?

1. the technologies being converged on their own were challenging enough earlier. Companies have now mastered them enough. They now need to have a roamap to stay ahead in a market where todays technology quickly becomes commodity once the competition catches up
2. better understanding of the usage patterns of various services that have evolved (did you have podcasts, YouTube five years ago?)
3. with improvements in the raw processing power, memory capacity, processing technologies that help minitiarization and reduction in power consumption/ heat dissipation, signal processing algorithms, convergence seems more thinkable now
4. and finally the time it takes to seep in complex technological problems and to be able to look at them from a thirty thousand feet removed perspective

Practical applications of a femto cell area network

Arrival of femto cells enable the convergence of fixed-line-based and mobile communication (FMC) services and extend the reach of RAN. It will open doors for new types of services or new ways of accessing existing services.

Peer to peer services
Direct voice communication using VoIP between two mobile units that are within the local area network covered by a femto cell (let's call it FAM) could be switched locally, avoiding air-time charges for the session. This can also optimize voice delivery in case one or more voice recipients of a push-to-talk group are present in the FAM.

Targeted services
Location aware ad-hoc groups can be formed for providing targeted services to the members of the group.

Fine grained control over service delivery
Hosts or organizers of an event (movie) can block radio signals so as to disallow direct incoming/ outgoing calls and allow only text or other non-intrusive services to be delivered to the subscribers. The contents being delivered over the femto cell can be lawfully intercepted by the provider organization to suit their policies. For example, an employer may then ensure sensitive data does not leak through employees' mobile phones.

Location awareness
The femto cell can feedback to the caller or the RAN about the location of the call recipient. For example, if person A calls person B and B is attending a meeting in a conference room or in a hospital, the caller A could be warned about this and would be given a chance whether to still continue the call to person B. It's similar to the status selection by an instant messenger user, just that it could be automated using the intelligence fed into a femto cell.

References

• Airvana Delivers Femto Network Gateway in Comprehensive Platform for Fixed Mobile Convergence