Service delivery over heterogeneous wireless systems

Abstract

The problem of service delivery over heterogeneous wireless access networks is quite complex and is a topic of ongoing research. Although a unifying aspect of current packet based wireless access technologies is that all of them support IP transport, a common architecture that would allow a mix of autonomous heterogeneous wireless networks to coexist and inter work to provide ubiquitous service using the best network for service delivery at any location does not currently exist. Such a common architecture is essential to enable interoperability across autonomous wireless systems. This paper provides components of a common architectural solution that enables automatic network selection at user terminals with network assistance. It defines new network layer nodes along with new functionality for some of the existing nodes in current systems. A concept of directory assistance type of functionality is introduced where the network could inform the user terminal about the best suited network for the requested service. The proposed architecture allows the user terminal to intelligently and automatically select the network, based on several parameters including service to be used, network QoS capabilities and current network conditions. The proposed architecture is flexible and would enable a variety of business models through different deployment scenarios.