BATH, UK and Hong Kong – 06 Sept 2011 Picochip and Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI) today announced that they have successfully completed the design and validation of the PC8609, the industry’s first commercial-grade LTE FDD femtocell physical layer software. The PC8609 software is now generally available (GA) to Picochip’s customers around the world.

Picochip and ASTRI started their close collaboration on LTE femtocell reference design in the middle of 2008 for both LTE FDD and TD-LTE. The two companies demonstrated the world’s first TD-LTE femtocell prototype in the Mobile World Congress in February, 2009 at Barcelona and have been working on both LTE FDD and TD-LTE since.

To ensure that the PC8609 software is ready for FDD femtocell commercial deployment, the two companies have completed more than 10,000 tests to validate the software integrity, including functional, performance, conformance and stack integration tests. The level of maturity brought from this test effort has led to the successful integration of the PC8609 with several protocol stack software (both 3rd party and customer) which have passed interoperability tests with multiple commercial LTE terminals and core networks. The TD-LTE version, the PC9608, is undergoing similar testing.

“This is not ‘example code’ or ‘demo-ware’, this is a fully tested, verified and carrier-class, deployable baseband system,” said Nigel Toon, CEO of Picochip. “For both 3G and 4G there are more basestations in the world that use our software than that of any other silicon supplier. Our experience in deploying high-volumes of systems that rely on the quality and robustness of our PHY is represented and captured in the PC8609. We appreciate the professionalism and skill of the ASTRI team in working with us to get this carrier-class product developed, tested and released.”

“We have been working closely with Picochip on this product since 2008,” added Dr. Nim-Kwan Cheung CEO of ASTRI. “This has been a very productive partnership, and we are delighted that Picochip has been able to make the LTE small-cell system generally available to the customers. We look forward to working together on future products.”

The two companies are continuing their collaboration to bring the PC8608 TD-LTE femtocell physical layer software, now in Beta, to the same maturity as PC8609.