A service-tailored TDD cell-less architecture

The emerging 5G systems are envisioned to support higher data volumes and a plethora of different services with diverse QoS demands. To accommodate such service requirements, a cost efficient and flexible network architecture considering different service types is desired. The adoption of C-RAN can reduce infrastructure costs especially for dense deployments while at the same time centralize and hence optimize certain operations related with the control and data plane of the associated cells. This paper investigates such C-RAN approach in the context of TDD networks enabling a cell-less experience for users residing within overlapping areas. In particular, users are allowed to utilize selected sub-frames from different cells forming, in this way, a customized cell-less frame in a flexible manner. A queueing model and analysis is provided for optimizing power control and delay targets. A simulation study shows that our cell-less proposal significantly advances the state of the art both in terms of application and system performance.