Telefónica O2 Europe today announced live femtocell experience trials in the UK in partnership with NEC Corporation and Ubiquisys, targeting a commercial launch of the technology by early 2009.

The UK's first full trial of femtocell technology – which is a new way of improving in-building 3G coverage – has begun an initial period of live testing in February.  If successful, the trial will be rolled out in greater numbers across the UK in the summer.

NEC – a leading provider of 3G infrastructure and handsets, internet and broadband network solutions – is O2's trial partner and has supplied an integrated solution centred around Ubiquisys ZoneGate femtocells.

Vivek Dev, Chief Operating Officer of Telefónica O2 Europe, said: "This technology has the potential to support increased growth in the usage and consumption of services and data and could play a crucial role in underpinning the explosive growth of mobile broadband usage."
Dev added: "Our Apple iPhone is already driving unheard-of levels of mobile internet usage, and the introduction of flat rate data tariffs is expected to increase this further. Both of these place huge capacity demands on our networks, and because so much of that usage is at home, femtocells coupled with DSL could provide an alternative capacity resource."

He said: "We see femtocells as complimentary to our outdoors coverage and, using our current service set as a base, we aim to build applications that our customers need and value.  The trial will help us define what is required to make femtocell services a success for our customers by understanding how customers will use the service."

Richard Hanscott, VP Network Solutions Europe, NEC, said "O2, NEC and Ubiquisys have collective reputations for practical innovation, and with femtocells we believe we know what is important.  Together with our partner Ubiquisys, we have a proven radio, network and management solution which allows customers to deploy femtocells quickly and easily, and allows operators to manage these in a customer centric way."

He added: "O2 has always been an innovator and marrying this with their experience of harnessing true customer requirements, it allows NEC to leverage this experience to create a robust solution. We fully expect the commercialisation of Femtocells to begin in 2009 and look forward to seeing the results of the landmark trial."

Chris Gilbert, CEO of Ubiquisys, said: "We are very happy to be working with Telefonica O2 Europe in this ground breaking trial which will take femtocell technology to the mass market.  Our ZoneGate femtocell is so simple to use that anyone can plug it in, it will automatically configure itself and work, so they can forget it's there."

Femtocells are designed to improve indoor 3G mobile-broadband coverage by re-routing data from cellular networks and onto wired DSL connections, building cellular coverage from the inside out.  O2 also launched trials in the Czech Republic this month, on the back of successful tests that have been carried out in Madrid by Telefónica since last year.

Sony Ericsson has launched XPERIA with the announcement of the XPERIA X1, an arc slider phone said to be designed to address the growing need for a premium, converged mobile experience.
 
The XPERIA X1 combines a 3-inch clear wide VGA display and a full QWERTY keyboard within a quality metal-finish body. With Windows Mobile inside, the XPERIA X1 lets you choose from a dynamic range of activities at anytime and anywhere; from enjoying your favourite entertainment content to working efficiently on-the-move.  Access a world of experiences simply by touching the XPERIA panel on the screen.
 
"XPERIA represents the first brand that is truly borne from within Sony Ericsson. It represents our vision for a premium, energised communication experience," said Dee Dutta, Head of Marketing, Sony Ericsson. "This launch, and the announcement of the X1, further strengthens the overall Sony Ericsson brand and places
us at the forefront of mobile convergence."
 
"Our vision for the XPERIA X1 is to deliver a seamless blend of mobile Web communication and multimedia entertainment within a distinctive design," said Rikko Sakaguchi, Head of Portfolio and Propositions, Sony Ericsson. "XPERIA is our promise to think foremost of user experience and to deliver the premium experience – anytime, anywhere, anything, with anyone."

JumpTap, the mobile search and advertising solutions provider, today announced that it has signed a multinational deal with TeliaSonera, the leading mobile operator in the Nordic and Baltic regions. This strategic move will see JumpTap deploy a comprehensive search and advertising solution across seven different network operators in Sweden, Spain, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Estonia and Lithuania.

JumpTap will be TeliaSonera's exclusive partner for all mobile advertising and paid search ads served on SurfPort, TeliaSonera's mobile Internet portal, and on SurfOpen, an Internet toolbar to be launched throughout the group during 2008, which follows the user both on and off portal.

Dan Olschwang, president and CEO at JumpTap, comments: "This is a monumental move for TeliaSonera and is testimony to the fact that the world's most innovative and progressive operators are deploying integrated white label search and mobile advertising services."

"SurfOpen is an important step into Mobile 2.0," says Indra Åsander, Senior Vice President, Head of Content Services, Europe Mobility Services, at TeliaSonera. "SurfOpen will bring improved options to the market to communicate with our mobile customers in seven countries. Our partnership with JumpTap will help our customers quickly and easily access to their favourite content and services wherever it exists on the Internet."

Olschwang concludes: "The full potential of the mobile marketing industry is only realised when subscribers are satisfied with their mobile web experience. By combining intelligence from search with operator gateway data, users get fast access to everything they are searching for in the most intuitive way possible. TeliaSonera understands the importance of openness and of simplifying the mobile web, which is why SurfOpen and JumpTap's search and advertising solutions work together to provide a positive user experience."

The Tellabs 8607 access switch is premiering at this year's Mobile World Congress.

"For advanced mobile services such as m-commerce, gaming, and location-based applications to gain traction with users, network reliability is critical," said Michael Howard, principal analyst from Infonetics Research. "There is no doubt that strengthening mobile backhaul improves the overall user experience for 3G applications, thereby enhancing the opportunity for operator revenue."

The new Tellabs 8607 access switch is a single, flexible solution for seamlessly connecting any generation mobile site to the rest of the network because it includes TDM, ATM, IP and Ethernet. Smartly designed to also include DSL functionality without additional hardware, this single device performs DSL jobs traditionally done by two devices. Since it makes deployment and management easier, it performs like a star in rapid deployments.

The carrier-class Tellabs 8607 switch ensures the network stays up, regardless of conditions. Features such as power redundancy and environmental hardening increase reliability and enable use in a wide range of temperatures. These features, not often found in solutions of this size, ensure that mobile users can always access their favorite mobile services, whether it's watching a movie or buying tickets to a premiere.

"The Tellabs 8607 access switch's size, ability to perform in extreme temperatures and support of fiber, copper, Ethernet and DSL makes it the most versatile solution for mobile service providers across the globe," said Mika Heikkinen, vice president and general manager of managed access products, Tellabs.

The Tellabs 8607 access switch supports fiber, copper, and various DSL technologies. It also supports microwave-based backhaul networks.

Customers can easily reconfigure the switch to meet any deployment need. Interface modules, including Fast Ethernet, E1/T1, ADSL and G.SHDSL, and power modules are easily swapped out. This modularity gives the switch its small size and versatility and ensures money isn't wasted powering unused interfaces.

Visto, the provider of mobile email, today announced that T-Mobile International has selected Visto Mobile to power T-Mobile's Mobile E-Mail Pro push email service.

"After a thorough evaluation of push email messaging platforms, T-Mobile selected Visto on the basis of its technology leadership as well as time-to-market advantages. Due to increasing demand from within our fast growing subscriber base, we are aggressively expanding our push-based mobile email offering," said Joachim Horn, chief technology officer of T-Mobile International.  "We recognize that more and more consumers and business customers would like the convenience and added responsiveness that mobile email can bring to their day. With the new Visto-powered service, we offer, easy-to-use, solution for mass market adoption."

Mobile E-Mail Pro from T-Mobile is available in Germany and is expected to roll out across Europe over the next 18 months. It will provide instant access to all types of Internet accounts as well as Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes email accounts from a broad range of consumer and business mobile devices including Symbian Series 40/60, UIQ, Windows Mobile 5/6 and Java enabled phones. In addition, users will be able to maintain and access an up-to-date calendar and contacts list centrally, via an online secure portal.

"Our selection by T-Mobile is again validation that Visto is providing the world's best technology to bring consumer and business email to any device, said Brian A. Bogosian, chairman, president and CEO of Visto."

"T-Mobile has a long history of quality of service and innovation," added Frederic Aries, senior vice president and general manager of Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) for Visto. "With more than 100 million subscribers on its network, T-Mobile is renowned for having one of the fastest growth rates for data products and services. T-Mobile's choice of Visto is a major milestone in our development in Europe and will significantly contribute to the rapid expansion of the mobile email market for all individuals.

Mentum has announced today at MWC that MTS Ukraine, a long time customer of its software products, has bought additional licenses of Mentum Planet RF planning and optimization software and associated prediction and optimization modules to support its network expansion. Included in the software purchase are WCDMA and HSPA licenses as well as advanced automated frequency planning (AFP) and automatic cell planning modules (ACP).

"We are providing our engineers with the advanced Mentum Planet 3G toolsets in anticipation of our network evolution to UMTS," said Andrey Malashok, head of radio planning department, MTS Ukraine. "Mentum Planet and the Capesso(tm) ACP will allow us to build optimized network designs in anticipation of our 3G spectrum acquisition."

Mentum Planet offers incredibly accurate predictions to help ensure its WCDMA and HSPA analyses reflect the network they are designed to simulate. Mentum Planet has HSPA capabilities supporting all deployment configurations including Rel. 99, HSDPA and HSUPA, and HSPA or Rel. 99 exclusively.

The Capesso ACP, developed by Mentum's strategic partner Symena, allows for the relatively quick development of 3G network plans that are demonstrably better than plans developed by RF engineers using traditional methods. These optimized plans deliver significantly improved coverage, capacity and quality over manually-developed plans and can jointly consider traffic served on two networks.

Renaissance AFP for Mentum Planet is an optional frequency planning solution that delivers best-in-class frequency plan quality with other advanced features. This advanced toolset is a cornerstone of Mentum's GSM>EDGE product offering, and will enable MTS Ukraine to aggressively reuse frequencies in delivering its wireless services.

"Mentum prides itself on being able to offer smart toolsets that enable our customers to be more efficient," said Bernard Breton, head of sales and marketing, Mentum. "We continue to innovate so long-standing customers like MTS Ukraine can have a single supplier of wireless planning and optimization solutions."

Mentum is exhibiting at Mobile World Congress 2008 in Barcelona, Stand # 2J63 (Hall 2).

Ericsson has announced an expansion of its managed services hosting offering, adding three new services to the portfolio: Me-On-TV, Hosted Location Based Services and Hosted Mobile Advertising. Ericsson takes full responsibility for integration and round-the-clock operations and maintenance of the services, which enables operators and service providers to focus on their core business.

Me-On-TV is a service supporting media companies, including broadcasters, production companies and websites, to benefit from users' wish to participate, contribute and share experiences. Me-On-TV enables interactive TV shows and new user generated content services by allowing citizen reporters equipped only with a video enabled phone to contribute to multimedia productions.

The Hosted Mobile Advertising service targets media companies and operators, providing new mobile channels for the media to distribute advertisements to large target groups through SMS, MMS or more advanced advertisements. The Hosted Mobile Advertising service also brings an additional revenue stream for operators by providing them with a key channel for advertising in the future.

Ericsson's Hosted Location Based Services provides a portfolio of location enabled applications for operators to target consumer and enterprise segments. Local Search, Family Finder and Friend Finder address the needs of mobile consumers to instantaneously find places or people. Workforce Management, a tracking and workforce management tool for the enterprise segment, enables companies to improve their efficiency by optimizing resource utilization.

"The Hosting business model is based on Ericsson's ability to support operators in launching new and appealing end-user services to the market quickly," says Jan Frykhammar, Senior Vice President and Head of Business Unit Global Services, Ericsson. "By launching a range of new and exciting hosted services, Ericsson reinforces its portfolio – underlining our position as the number one hosting partner."

NeuStar has announced that it will be showcasing personalised and contextual mobile advertising embedded in its Instant Messaging (IM) solution.  NeuStar's demonstration at GSMA Mobile World Congress 2008 shows innerActive Smart Media's ad-funded mobile entertainment channel embedded inside NeuStar's leading mobile IM application as part of its Interaction Framework (iFTM).

The solution will enable operators and brands to deliver "experience-based" and interactive advertising through a range of models, including toaster pop-up banners, product placement, and branded information services called "presence-enabled Ad Buddies" through the operator's mobile IM service.

Mobile IM is the platform to deliver all types of interactive content (video, text, music and gaming), and is a natural environment for direct, non-intrusive, and rich mobile advertising. It provides control and choice to the mobile user – and operators and brands can now deliver a more personal and intuitive advertising experience.

Allen Scott, general manager at NeuStar Next Generation Messaging (NGM), said: "NeuStar understands mobile, and has created a solution which will revolutionise advertising. The mobile is part of someone's personal space, and is completely different from the PC and the Internet. Mobile IM will provide premium real estate for advertisers to target ‘mobile eyeballs' and for brands to create communities of consumers interested in specific products or services."

Scott continued: "Advertising over mobile IM provides new revenue streams and is creating new partnerships between operators, advertising agencies, brands, publishers, and third party developers to deliver an on-demand, interactive, and rich mobile advertising experience. NeuStar's third party developer program, called the Innovation Zone, is driving innovation over mobile IM – and innerActive is helping operators to capitalise on the new opportunities mobile IM brings."

Offer Yehudai, innerActive's co-CEO, said: "We are very excited to enable this new advertising capability with the leader in mobile IM and Presence services. Operators will benefit from attractive advertising pricing schemes, and users will benefit from the option of communicating for free or at discounted rates. innerActive provides operators access to its global Ad Network, and is also able to integrate with online advertising systems."

Developers can build new or add value to existing services and capabilities in the knowledge that their service will be integrated into a framework that can be accessed by more than 300 million mobile users worldwide through NeuStar's existing mobile IM solutions that are currently live.

Working with more than 31 leading operators worldwide – including Vodafone, 3, Orange, Telecom Italia, Turkcell, and Beeline – NeuStar has the most field-proven launches of a range of mobile IM services. Building on its success and experience in the market since 1999, NeuStar has developed its pioneering services, working with operators and their users through focus groups, user forums, and research campaigns to provide a compelling service to meet all operators' demands and service models.

Ericsson will make the 'world's first' demonstration of an end-to-end phone call enabled by Long-Term Evolution – System Architecture Evolution (LTE/SAE), employing handheld mobile devices, at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

The demonstration call will be made using handheld mobile devices developed by Ericsson Mobile Platforms. Ericsson's LTE network equipment supports multi-user data rates of up to 160Mbps per cell.

LTE/SAE represents the next step in the evolution of the user experience, improving latency, capacity and throughput. Commercial launch is expected in 2009.

LTE supports a superior, mass-market user experience. It enhances such demanding applications as mobile video, blogging, advanced games, rich multimedia telephony and professional services. It also interoperates with existing cellular systems.

Robert Puskaric, head of Ericsson's mobile platforms business, says: "This world-first demonstration marks a key milestone in the development of LTE. It proves the stability and integration of our platform with a form factor accurate handheld device, reaching uplink and downlink data speeds of 25Mbit/s already today. Samples of our first LTE platform will be available in 2008."

Ulf Ewaldsson, Vice President and Head of Product Area Radio at Ericsson, says: "Today's demonstration of a complete end-to-end solution, including a small form factor accurate device operated over a flat network architecture, reaffirms Ericsson's technology leadership. It also reflects our commitment to developing LTE as an evolutionary path that will boost operators' service offering, while providing end users with a superior experience."

LTE is the next evolution in mobile network standards as defined by the 3GPP (Third-Generation Partnership Project) and supports operations in both the paired spectrum and unpaired spectrum. It enables efficient spectrum utilization for both legacy and future wireless frequency bands. Channel bandwidths of 1.4-20MHz are supported. The wide international support for LTE ensures economies of scale, enabling cost-effective solutions for network operators.

This world-first demonstration follows another recent Ericsson first, the demonstration of LTE in both Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) and Time Division Duplex (TDD) mode on the same base station platform.