In New Delhi: The WiMAX Forum and the Femto Forum has announced the publication of the WiMAX femtocell standard that will allow vendors to start developing standardised femtocells and associated network equipment based on the IEEE 802.16e radio interface and profiles.
According to the official statement issued by the WiMAX Forum, it is expected to start certifying compatible products in early 2011 to guarantee efficient and effective interoperability between different vendors access points and core network equipment.
WiMAX femtocells cost-effectively enhance coverage and capacity inside buildings and in small outdoor areas as well as supporting advanced new services. The WiMAX Forum has been working with the Femto Forum since June 2009 to ensure that the entire femtocell and WiMAX ecosystems cooperate to enable the most effective possible standard and release the full potential of both technologies.
The specifications incorporate a security framework that allows WiMAX networks to support a large number of access points via standard commercial IPSec based security gateways. This phase of specifications also contains simple Self Organizing Network (SON) capabilities to allow automatic configuration of large numbers of femtocells. Future revisions will further enhance the SON capabilities to standardize automatic interference management between femtocells and macro base stations.
The standard also incorporates support for three usage models to support different deployment scenarios such as residential, enterprise and outdoor environments. The Open Model allows the femtocell to operate like a normal WiMAX base station by allowing anyone to use the service; Closed Subscriber Group (CSG) Closed allows a limited number of pre-allocated subscribers to use the femtocell. The Closed Subscriber Group (CSG) Open extends the previous model to allow the subscriber to add users themselves.
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