The Business Case for Picocells and Femtocells in the Enterprise Market

• What are enterprises' key requirements for indoor services?
• What can be learnt from early movers that are already deploying indoor base stations?
• What are the key elements of the MNO business case for indoor base stations? What is the quantitative business case for a number of deployment scenarios? What user densities and ARPU levels are necessary in order to achieve an adequate financial return?
• How can improvements in transmission costs improve business case viability?
• Given that picocells represent an immediate deployment option, is there a role for femtocells in the enterprise market and, if so, how and when?
• What are the critical ingredients, over and above the deployment of indoor base station equipment, needed for success?
• How should MNOs compete against emerging WLAN services that use dual-mode handsets?
• What actions should MNOs and indoor base station vendors take in order to seize the opportunities for indoor base stations in the enterprise market?

Summary

1 Deploying picocells and femtocells in the enterprise market will be challenging

2 Indoor base stations could help MNOs to attract enterprises

2.1 MNOs must not neglect the enterprise market

2.2 The provision of indoor services is an area of weakness for MNOs

2.3 Indoor base stations could enable MNOs to counter the threat of alternative solutions

2.4 MNOs should strive to meet the challenging indoor service requirements of the business market

2.5 MNOs should apply commerical logic to the deployment of indoor base stations

3 Early movers are seizing opportunities with 2G picocells

3.1 2G picocells are already commercially available and deployed

3.2 Low-power GSM licences have been awarded in the UK and are suitable for picocell services

3.3 Spring Mobil targets Swedish enterprises with picocell services

4 ARPU and transmission costs underpin picocell service viability

4.1 Current standalone picocell services require 30 users or more to achieve financial viability

4.2 The most sensitive aspects of the business case are ARPU and transmission

4.2 There is substantial value in targeting smaller businesses

5 3G femtocells have potential in very small businesses

5.1 Opportunities for 3G femtocells exist beyond the consumer market

5.2 3G femtocells could support non-voice services, but with possible transmission and capacity bottlenecks

5.3 The potential for 3G femtocells to support greater user densities needs thorough investigation

6 Enterprise solutions require a number of factors to succeed

6.1 Indoor base station equipment is just one component of an enterprise solution

6.2 MNOs must target the weaknesses of WLAN services

Actions

List of Figures and Tables

Figure 0.1 Major revenue and cost elements of an MNO's business case for indoor base station deployment in enterprises

Figure 2.1 The scope of enterprise mobility

Figure 2.2 Major revenue and cost elements of an MNO's business case for indoor base station deployment in enterprises

Figure 4.1 Breakdown of cost to MNOs per user per month for an enterprise picocell solution, for different numbers of users

Figure 4.2 ARPU generated by an enterprise picocell service in three scenarios

Figure 4.3 Number of service users required by a picocell operator to achieve a 10% revenue margin, given three different transmission solutions

Figure 5.1 Incremental ARPU per month in two enterprise femtocell service scenarios

Figure 5.2 Cost per user per month in two enterprise femtocell service scenarios

Figure 6.1 Estimated up-front investment cost per user for a WLAN VoIP solution

Table 2.1 The scope of enterprise mobility

Table 3.1 Bids for low-power GSM licences in the UK

Table 5.1 Typical average downlink throughput of GSM and W-CDMA family of cellular technologies in different environments

Table 5.2 Two enterprise femtocell scenarios that achieve satisfactory financial return