Femtocells to improve home security, mobile phones and hi-tech

According to a forecast made by ABI Research soon femtocells will be able to improve home security, personal safety and help integrate smartphones with TVs, laptops and media players, in addition to improving cellular coverage in the home. The research agency foresees that in near future parents will trace when their children arrive home due to the femtocells that will register the presence of kids’ mobile phones and sends out SMS notifications to the parents.

Such kind of applications can also turn on lights or activate security systems, while others can be used to synchronize content between mobile phones and TVs, laptops and media players, according to ABI.

The technique principle is that the applications all take advantage of user presence and location. Femtocells are small base stations, and they know when a registered user is in its coverage zone, which the applications in turn can take advantage of.

So far, mobile operators haven't been able to take advantage of the application revolution on smartphones. But femtocells could give them a much needed boost. However, the operators need to act fast, as the popularity of Wi-Fi and GPS-based applications could pose a threat, according to ABI.