Signal improvements

Patchy indoor coverage has been an irksome issue for mobile phone users from consumers to the largest enterprise, but has only recently been addressed by deploying dedicated internal access points to extend signal strength inside premises. Though SMEs (small-medium enterprises) in particular have missed out, as femtocells emerged to solve residential coverage problems, while more sophisticated systems based on distributed antennae or micro cells have been available some years for large industrial or business sites. But the latter involve significant radio frequency (RF) planning, along with expensive onsite management on the part of the operator, and are not cost-effective for most SMEs. Along came femtocells, with powerful units aimed at SMEs and smaller offices of larger enterprises.