Like many young adults, none of my four, grown-up children has a fixed line telephone. Their generation has largely substituted mobile phones for traditional phone lines, even though coverage in their homes and workplaces is not always great. But help could be at hand to reduce the frustration of low signal strength and poor call quality at home or work. Some of the world’s largest mobile network operators are testing new mini cellular base stations, called femtocells, designed to improve in-building call quality and coverage.

These small, low-power wireless base stations, which plug into a broadband internet connection, are at the cutting edge of fixed/mobile telecoms convergence and could del­­iver benefits for both consumers and network operators. They could operate alongside other technologies that improve in-building cellular coverage like WiFi-enabled dual mode handsets that use the UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access) standard.