ABI Research is forecasting growth this year for Indoor Small Cells, which are better known as femtocells. It says unit volumes are expected to increase in 2013 and 2014 with year-on-year growth higher than previous forecasts.
Overall enterprise and consumer femtocell shipments are predicted to reach 3.8 million units this year and 5.7 million units in 2014. Although 3G small cells will still represent the majority of shipments, 4G LTE indoor small cell numbers are expected to increase significantly from this year.
This growth will be driven by network operators encouraging the use of femtocells in both enterprise and residential settings.
Nick Marshall, principal analyst at ABI Research, said “The recent Small Cell World Summit in London also offered some positive signs that the market is growing with attendance up by 50% including 230 operator delegates from 110 companies and with Cisco’s recent acquisition of Ubiquisys there is some real momentum building now. Another strong indicator of the emergence of a meaningful and growing indoor small cells market was the almost simultaneous announcements by both Qualcomm and Texas Instruments of latest generation baseband SoC’s for small cells.”
[ABI Research Enterprise and Consumer Femtocells]