NEC and Kineto have submitted their unlicensed mobile access (UMA) technology to the 3GPP and the Femto Forum in hopes of quickly settling on a standard for the burgeoning femtocell market.

UMA is the protocol used in Wi-Fi fixed/mobile convergence networks such as those deployed by T-Mobile and Cincinnati Bell. It tunnels the GSM signal over the Wi-Fi connection and public Internet back to a carrier’s core network. Kineto is arguing that the protocol it developed and standardized for the Wi-Fi FMC world can be easily modified for the Iu-over-IP interfaces that the 3GPP and Femto Forum are attempting to standardize for femtocells.

Carriers have been eyeing femtocells very closely as they formulate their FMC plans. The main advantage they have over Wi-Fi solutions is that they do not require specialty handsets with Wi-Fi radios. While multiple Wi-Fi handsets have emerged lately, they represent only the tiniest fraction of overall GSM and CDMA handsets on the market. Samsung already has CDMA femtocells in Sprint’s pilot FMC network, and the vendor expects there will be several full-scale femtocell rollouts this year. Other vendors have followed the Korean manufacturer. This week Motorola announced the first two products in its femtocell line, both with UMTS radios. The devices will be ready for commercial deployments in the second half of the year, Moto said.

While Kineto has a definite interest in seeing its own technology penetrate into what could be a gigantic market, vice president of marketing Steve Shaw said an already finalized and tested standard UMA offers the quickest path toward cementing a final femtocell standard this year. All the major vendors have taken an active interest in femtocells, but none have proposed a unifying transport standard to connect the femtocell to the network, he said.

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