Femtocell is a small cellular base station, which is designed for in-building environments, enhancing indoor coverage. It enables to use cellular devices where the cellular signal is low, the reception is poor and the access to the cellular service is limited or even unavailable.  It amplifies the cellular signal, can support several phones and improves not only coverage, but also voice quality. Today, many cellular operators provide this service enabling their subscribers (private users and enterprises) to use their mobile phone without interruption at home or at work.

The Femtocell Growing Market

According to a press release of ABI Research, “The femtocell market will see a steady growth as revenues reach $4.2B in 2019 owing to a rise in enterprise unit shipments.” ABI Research says that “With femtocell deployments mainly focusing on coverage, 3G units dominated shipments. However, with global roll-outs of LTE there is a growing demand for multi-mode products, especially in advanced markets such as the United States which is characterized by a CAGR of 130% in the next 5 years.”

Small Cells and Femtocells:  Market Driving Forces - the Need for Increased Local Signal Strength

A press release of ReportsnReports.com says that according to a research of WinterGreen Research “small cell and femtocell market shipments are forecast to reach $5.98 billion by 2019. Market growth comes because there is no other way to build out wireless data infrastructure in an economical manner. The delivery of apps is anticipated to grow to a $236 trillion, yes trillion dollar, market by 2019. This means a lot of data streaming around. Market driving forces relate primarily to the need for increased local signal strength. . Services providers are positioning with various small cell and femtocell models to meet huge demand as the world moves to 8.5 billion smart phones in use by 2019 and trillions of interconnected sensors on the Internet of Things.”

Avoiding Installation of Expensive Femtocells

CALLUP developed an innovative solution enabling cellular operators to switch calls automatically and seamlessly from cellular to IP networks. The solution helps operators save expenses and avoid installation of expensive femtocells.

It identifies available wireless networks and forwards calls over the Internet without reducing their quality. The entire process is completely transparent to the user, who uses his regular phone user-interface to make a call. It seamlessly intercepts the voice from the circuit switch network, and routes it via the data network path.

The Client-Server Architecture of CALLUP’s Solution

The solution is based on a client-server model. The client needs to be installed on the user’s mobile phone. The client is fully provisioned from the server, which has Patent pending Algorithm of QoS and can update settings over the air, enabling the mobile carrier to fine tune and control the behavior of the clients.
The server side part of the solution is integrated with the carrier’s IMS or Soft Switch. The provisioning allows enforcing the desired policy on the clients out there.  The client-server communications are based on TLS or HTTPS, the client validates the server SSL certificates and a special hashing algorithm based on the IMSI of the sender and other parameters are validated on the server to prevent spoofing and hackers tampering.

Enhanced Security

CALLUP’s solution uses DH 256 bits key exchange to generate per subscriber key. It uses double encrypted heartbeats by using TCP over SSL and internal AES-256 encryption of client/server communication. SSL certificate pinning prevents MITM attacks and internal server algorithms detect fraud and spoofing.

Not only Saving Femtocell Costs – Saving Roaming Costs as well

The ability to transfer phone calls transparently from the cellular network to available IP networks allows the mobile operator to remove a large burden from the network, enhance in-building user experience, and improve customer service. In addition, this capability allows the operator to save not only femtocell costs, but also roaming costs when customer calls are forwarded to another operator, such as when the subscriber is abroad or in remote locations where the operator's coverage is not good."