TeliaSonera has chosen two vendors for two femtocell trials this Spring, according to an Unstrung report. Johan Wickman, Senior Vice President for Mobility R&D at the operator, told the newswire that one of the Spring trials will be based in Sweden, with plans afoot to start larger trials with end users in the third quarter of this year.

Last week Mobile Business Briefing reported that T-Mobile plans femtocell trials in Germany, the Netherlands and the UK in the second quarter of this year, indicating the growing momentum behind the technology.  According to Unstrung, of all the operators trialing 3G femtocells to date – including T-Mobile, Vodafone, Orange France and Telefonica – Japan’s Softbank has set the most aggressive timeline for deployment and aims for a commercial launch of a 3G femtocell in the fourth quarter this year. Sprint Nextel has already launched a 2G femtocell from Samsung, and Verizon is tipped by Unstrung to follow the operator’s lead and deploy the same device.