Virtualization Techniques for Redesigning Mobile Backhaul Networks: Challenges and Issues

Mobile networks will have to cope in the next future with a dramatic increase of the volume of data traffic, boosted by the widespread of connected terminals (smartphones, tablets and associated devices). Users eventually expect to use their radio connections independently of the access technology, whether through WiFi or 4G/5G, and to seamlessly move from one access technology to the other. This situation urges operators to implement a real fixed/mobile convergence, which has been for decades a recurrent issue in the design of telecommunication networks. Mobile and fixed networks have been developed independently one of each other, mobile networks relying on highly centralized platforms and a few gateways to interconnect with the Internet for data traffic. One major obstacle to fixed/mobile convergence is that networks are built upon functions hosted by dedicated hardware (e.g., the functions of the evolved packet core for cellular networks). But the rapid development of virtualization and cloud computing techniques opens the door to new opportunities of realizing fixed/mobile convergence. As a matter of fact, those technologies make it possible to host on the same piece of equipment or in the cloud cellular and fixed access functions. In this talk, we exemplify the groundbreaking opportunity offered by virtualization techniques by describing the design of a convergent gateway aimed at realizing fixed/mobile convergence, such a gateway being instantiated by a network operating system. The deployment of such gateways also raises new issues with regard to monitoring and charging. The real challenge addressed by this talk is to design a convergent backhaul network and new monitoring and charging schemes for 5G networks.