Where is something about technology, there’s BMW! So, this year, at the Mobile World Congress they presented their version of mobile femtocells. The technology promises to optimize the mobile radio networks that will come in the future.

Exactly one year ago, BMW presented the “Vehicular Small Cell” concept, and these days it unveils the extended research of this project, called “Vehicular CrowdCell”. While the last year’s technology optimizes the mobile radio reception onboard, this year’s extension enhances the mobile radio network’s capacity and coverage outside the car. To develop this technology, BMW asked the help of two specialists, peiker and Nash Technologies.

Ok, so how exactly can they help us? Let’s think of the car-sharing fleets, especially those containing electric vehicles. If they are parked in different cities, they can act as local radio relays. So, if a user is close to a mobile femtocell, this will be automatically activated to provide an extended network coverage or to increase the bandwidth. The result is a dynamical optimization of the already existing network performance. So, if you’re a regular mobile phone user, who wants to send, receive or play large files, in the future you can benefit on-demand over an improved data rate. I can only imagine a BMW advertise ten years from now: “Poor radio connectivity? Buy a BMW!”.

The Mobile World Congress takes part every year in Barcelona and it’s the most important mobile communication show in Europe, alongside the Berlin’s IFA.