Last week saw the Small Cell World Summit (SCWS) taking place in London. The growing scale and strategic nature of this segment was highlighted by the increased size of the conference compared to previous years (over 700 delegates). However, the discussions and debates were focused heavily on the challenges that remain before small cells become truly mainstream ‘ or indeed, before they become just ‘cells’ and no longer require a conference of their own. That is some years away ‘ beyond the residential sector, the platform remains untried in many markets, and though LTE will be a major driver for public access metrocells, most 4G carriers are deploying first with conventional macrocells and microcells. The true small cells (integrated SoC architectures; automated management; very low size, cost and power) will usually follow in the second wave of LTE roll-out ‘ but how quickly that small cell phase kicks off will depend on the industry addressing some of the key issues highlighted in London. This was no longer an event to talk up the high hopes of a future technology, but one examining the nitty-gritty of practical deployment . And all the better for it, since solutions in areas like site planning, power management, backhaul and macro network interworking, while less exciting than dreams of HetNets, will make the difference between small cells achieving critical mass in 2014-2015, or having to wait until the second half of the decade.