UK-based fabless semiconductor company Lime Microsystems has joined the Femto Forum, the independent industry and operator association that supports femtocell deployment worldwide. The Forum promotes the adoption of femtocell technologies through open standards, market education and ecosystem development. The working groups’ mission is to ensure the rapid and effective deployment of femtocells to support a wide variety of customer propositions and operator business models.
Lime Microsystems announced first silicon in April 2008 and the company’s transceiver design can be digitally configured to operate in any required frequency band between 375 MHz and 4 GHz, with 16 user-selectable bandwidths up to 28 MHz.
This means it can transmit and receive data across all WiMAX bands (including those used in different geographical areas), as well as those used for W-CDMA and HSPA, and those that are planned for LTE.
The company will immediately participate in two of the Forum’s working groups—Marketing and Promotion and the Radio and Physical Layer. The former looks at how the industry should best position femtocells within the industry and to the wider public, build usage cases, agree on common terminology and manage any potential concerns.
The Radio and Physical Layer group is developing standardised RF interfaces, clarifying the various capability classes of femtocell and examining interactions with outdoor cells.