www.scf.io/ www.smallcellforum.org

RELEASE

DOCUMENT

Release Structure and Roadmap

February 2013

100.01.01

SMALL CELL FORUM

One scf.io/

Report title: Release Structure and Roadmap Issue date: 19 February 2013 Version: 100.01.01

Small Cell Forum supports the wide-scale adoption of small cells. Its mission is to accelerate small cell adoption to change the shape of mobile networks and maximise the potential of the mobile internet.

‘Small cells’ is an umbrella term for operator-controlled, low-powered radio access nodes, including those that operate in licensed spectrum and unlicensed carrier-grade Wi-Fi. Small cells typically have a range from 10 metres to several hundred metres. These contrast with a typical mobile macrocell that might have a range of up to several tens of kilometres. The term ‘small cells’ covers femtocells, picocells, microcells and metrocells.

Small Cell Forum is a not-for-profit, international organisation, with membership open to providers of small cell technology and to operators with spectrum licences for providing mobile services.

At the time of writing, the Small Cell Forum has 141 members including 68 operators representing more than 3 billion mobile subscribers – 46 per cent of the global total – as well as telecoms hardware and software vendors, content providers and innovative start-ups.

The Small Cell Forum is technology-agnostic and independent. It is not a standards-setting body, but works with standards organisations and regulators worldwide to provide an aggregated view of the small cell market.

This document forms part of the Small Cell Forum’s Release One. The theme of Release One is the Home, and includes the complete body of work operators will need to know in order to deploy:

Femtocells intended for home or small office applications. These applications are based typically indoors and involve locations where a single femtocell is usually sufficient. Both 3GPP and 3GPP2 femtocells are included in the scope of this Release.

Release One also contains significant advanced work packages that will inform future release themes, including enterprise, metro, and rural small cells.

The Small Cell Forum Release website can be found here www.scf.io and an overview of all the material in Release One: Home can be found here www.scf.io/doc/101

A description and roadmap for the release programme itself can be found here www.scf.io/doc/100

If you would like more information about the Small Cell Forum or would like to be included on our mailing list, please contact:

Email info@smallcellforum.org

Post Small Cell Forum, PO Box 23, GL11 5WA UK

Member Services Lynne Price-Walker lynne@smallcellforum.org

For a full list of members and further information visit our website www.smallcellforum.org

Report title: Release Structure and Roadmap Issue date: 19 February 2013 Version: 100.01.01

Scope

This document provides an overview of Small Cell Forum’s Release Programme. It outlines the thinking behind its creation and provides a roadmap of the applications and themes that it will address.

Report title: Release Structure and Roadmap Issue date: 19 February 2013 Version: 100.01.01

Executive summary

• Small Cell Forum’s mission is to accelerate the adoption of small cells. To this end the organisation has built up a body of work that addresses the full range of technologies that is covered by the term ‘small cells’ — from residential and enterprise femtocells to public access metrocells and microcells, to small cells associated with rural deployments.

• That body of work is growing. Therefore to better manage and access this work we have adopted a release structure. This release structure will bring the work together in way that will make it easier to understand the big picture. However, it will also enable quick navigation to the supporting detail.

• A release contains a number of packages, each of which addresses one of four use cases. They are: • Residential • Enterprise • Metro • Rural

• The content of each package evolves with the needs of the market it addresses. • For markets coming early to small cell adoption, information is provided to clarify needs

and identify potential technical and economic barriers to first commercial deployments. • For markets joining later, learnings and best practices from the early adopters are shared.

This can help drive volume and bring down costs. • In some cases technologies may be established and in regular use. For these cases the release

programme offers a complete package containing ‘all you need to know’ to commercially deploy a large-scale small cell technology. An overview accompanies each release and provides the wider picture along with key facts. This overview also acts as a guide to the full set of detailed supporting documents.

• For each release, the Forum will provide a major update to one or more use case package along the lines of a particular theme. For example, the theme for Release 1.0, February 2013, is residential applications under the heading Home. The next two packages, to be completed in the coming 12 months, will cover enterprise and metro applications.

Report title: Release Structure and Roadmap Issue date: 19 February 2013 Version: 100.01.01

Contents

1. Introduction .................................................................... 1 2. Release packages and market maturity ........................... 2

3. Packaging up the body of work ........................................ 3 4. Package contents: what’s in the box? .............................. 4 5. Release roadmap ............................................................. 6 References ................................................................................. 7

Figures Figure 2-1 The work of Small Cell Forum evolves as markets mature. For

established technologies SCF can provide a complete ‘all you need to know’ package to assist large scale adoption by the mainstream .......... 2

Figure 4-1 For established technologies the SCF Release provides complete package with ‘all you need to know’ to commercially deploy small cell technology, plus a concise overview. (Chapters for residential femtocells shown; other use cases may differ) ................................... 4

Figure 5-1 Each release addresses the full range of small cell use cases, and will provide a major update to one or more packages along the lines of a theme .......................................................................................... 6

Report title: Release Structure and Roadmap Issue date: 19 February 2013 Version: 100.01.01 1

1. Introduction

Small Cell Forum has been working since 2007 to stimulate the adoption of small cell technologies.

The work of the Forum has evolved along with market needs. Initially it addressed technology and regulatory barriers. More recently it has focused on sharing learning and best practices from early adopters.

This has led to the development of a large and growing body of material. To make the most of this important and useful work a new structure has been developed. This structure allows our audience to derive the maximum possible value from our work. It does this by offering both a concise overview and, for those requiring more detailed information, a guide that helps them to locate the information they need.

We call this structure the Small Cell Forum Release programme. It brings together related material into complete packages, providing what we hope will be all you need to know about the various small cell use cases.

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2. Release packages and market maturity

The mission of Small Cell Forum is:

“Accelerating small cell adoption to change the shape of mobile networks and maximise the potential of the mobile Internet”

Small Cell Forum recognises that different markets for small cells are at different stages of maturity. They therefore require different kinds of help to accelerate adoption.

Figure 2-1 will probably be familiar. It shows an adoption curve. This curve segments the market according to each group’s attitude towards new technologies. Each new segment comes with new needs to add to those of the segments that precede it. For example, early adopters (enthusiasts and visionaries in the diagram) want to differentiate themselves with new technologies. However, they still need help in clarifying market needs and breaking down barriers. These barriers include the standards and regulatory issues faced in the run-up to early trials and the launch of the first commercial networks. The later market is made up of so-called pragmatists. What they need most of all is reassurance from others that bugs have been ironed out and that solutions are scalable.

Figure 2-1 The work of Small Cell Forum evolves as markets mature. For established technologies SCF can provide a complete ‘all you need to know’ package to assist large scale adoption by the mainstream

Whether the need is to understand markets and identify barriers, to ensure standardisation and interoperability, or to share the learnings of early adopters for the benefit of all, the packages we provide are designed to meet that need. Where a technology is firmly established, and has already been commercially deployed by leading operators, we are able to provide a complete ‘all you need to know’ package. This aims to stimulate wide adoption and bring the benefits of economies of scale to all. The release packages vary in their contents to suit the level of market maturity.

The work is never totally finished of course. Small cells continue to find new applications, and the Forum continues its work at the cutting edge, breaking down barriers towards commercial deployments of the pioneering use cases of today and, we are sure, tomorrow. That is why, alongside the process of building up the complete package, we will continue to make available the individual papers, presentations and reports to maintain the momentum of small cells towards both market maturity and new applications.

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3. Packaging up the body of work

Put very simply then, the main purpose of the release programme is to package our work in a way that not only makes it easier to understand the big picture, but to look inside the packaging and quickly find the detailed work that supports it.

Small Cell Forum addresses all small cell technologies, from residential and enterprise femtocells to public access metrocells and microcells, to small cells suitable for rural deployment. The technology is of course similar for all applications. However, the needs of individual markets are not. That is why we have decided to package our body of work according to four key use cases. They are:

• Home • Enterprise • Metro • Rural

This list may expand as new use cases emerge to meet new market needs. For example mobile small cells, serving buses, trains, boats or aeroplanes, are a potential future use case.

Although documents will be principally presented by use case, this approach also makes it possible to view our material grouped according to other themes. Grouped under the radio access technology theme, for instance, the headings might be:

• 3G • LTE • 4G • LTE-Advanced • Wi-Fi • Multimode

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4. Package contents: what’s in the box?

The main purpose of each package, as we have said, is to provide the market with ‘all you need to know’ to commercially deploy a small cell technology.

This is clearly relevant in the case of established technologies already in regular use. Thus a complete package addressing these technologies contains a collection of white papers, case studies, technology descriptions, and a host of other material covering the wide range of knowledge that needs to be gathered to enable large-scale commercial deployment of small cells.

The content is organised into ‘chapters’, each of which addresses a range of both technical and economic issues (see Figure 2). The earlier chapters clarify the exact needs of the market and identify the key elements of a successful business case. Technical, standards and regulatory issues are also addressed, as well as the Forum’s work to ensure wide interoperability between equipment vendors. The package rounds off its analysis with a progress report showing market momentum and forecasts for the future.

Each complete package will include a concise overview document that extracts key messages from each chapter and acts as a guide to the full range of detailed documents. However, before the complete package is ready, the developing body of knowledge for each use case will be made available to help further the establishment of technologies in the early stages of market adoption. Overviews will not be available until the full set of knowledge is assembled.

Figure 4-1 For established technologies the SCF Release provides complete package with ‘all you need to know’ to commercially deploy small cell technology, plus a concise overview. (Chapters for residential femtocells shown; other use cases may differ)

Please note that Figure 4-1 illustrates the chapter headings associated with the first major theme, residential femtocells. Contents of other packages will be organised on broadly the same lines but may

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contain additional chapters specific to that particular market. One example of this is the metro package, which includes a chapter on site issues and backhaul.

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5. Release roadmap

As we have noted, Small Cell Forum releases will address all use cases, providing information specific to the needs of each market and its level of maturity. These use cases will be the focus and theme of a major update to one or more packages. The first of these – Release One, available in February 2013 – will focus on residential femtocells under the heading Home. The small cells covered will be:

Femtocells intended for home or small office applications. These applications are typically indoors and involve locations where a single femtocell is usually sufficient. Both 3GPP and 3GPP2 femtocells are within the scope of this release.

Subsequent releases in the following year will focus on providing complete packages for both enterprise and metro use cases (see Figure 5-1).

Figure 5-1 Each release addresses the full range of small cell use cases, and will provide a major update to one or more packages along the lines of a theme

The Forum will go on to issue complete packages for all major use cases, as well as updates to LTE and presentations addressing cross-use case aspects such as multimode small cells.

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References

Small Cell Forum release website – scf.io

Small Cell Forum Home documents – scf.io/use_case/home

Small Cell Forum Enterprise documents – scf.io/use_case/enterprise

Small Cell Forum Metro documents – scf.io/use_case/metro

Small Cell Forum Metro documents – scf.io/use_case/rural