Workshop on Cloud-Processing in Heterogeneous Mobile Communication Networks


Friday, 12 June 2015 • 09:00 – 18:00

WS-25: Cloud-Processing in Heterogeneous Mobile Communication Networks (IWCPM)

Organizer: Dirk Wübben (University of Bremen, Germany)

Heterogeneous radio access networks where macro-cellular networks are complemented by dense small-cell deployments promise to provide exceptionally greater wireless area capacity through an increased spatial utilization of the spectrum. Due to strong inter-cell interference, heterogeneous networks will require a high degree of coordination as offered by centralized processing. The IWCPM workshop explores novel concepts to allow for flexibly centralized radio access networks using cloud-processing based on open IT platforms, and to allow for a high quality of experience for mobile access to cloud-processing resources. This requires new concepts for the design, operation, and optimization of radio access networks, backhaul networks, operation and management algorithms, and architectural elements, tightly integrating mobile networks and cloud-processing. The workshop covers technologies across physical layer, medium access control layer, and network layer, and it will cover technologies which translate the cloud-paradigm to the radio access network and backhaul network. It will study the requirements, constraints, and implications for mobile communication networks.


Welcome Message

Keynote-1: 5G RAN Architecture Challenges

Industry consensus on the vision for 5G is slowly forming, it will pull together a wide range of applications from very low bit rate M2M to ultra high speed internet access, the key feature will be flexibility. The technology and standards will be developed by 2020. One of the challenges will be creating a technology that can use the wide contiguous bandwidths in the mmWave band. New RAN architectures are being considered by the industry as intelligence and processing power moves from the traditional base station to local nodes, and even to a centralised cloud. This keynote will consider the technology challenges posed by such an architecture, and highlight the gains already being seen in equivalent LTE based systems. Finally it will provide challenges to the research community for areas we need more work in.Bernd Haberland (Alcatel-Lucent): Cloud RAN architecture evolution from 4G to 5G Mobile Systems

Keynote-2: Cloud RAN architecture evolution from 4G to 5G Mobile Systems

The talk starts with a motivation section: why to introduce CRAN for 4G and 5G. This is followed by an architecture description for 4G. After this use cases for 5G are discussed and a generalized CRAN architecture for 4G and 5G is derived. The need of an adaptive processing split between a local and a central CRAN is highlighted and the use cases and orchestration criterions for these splits are indicated. A possible basic SW architecture for a Local and Central CRAN will be shown. Finally open research questions are listed followed by a summary.

Selected Topics 1

Joint Precoding and Fronthaul Optimization for C-RANs in Ergodic Fading Channels
Jinkyu Kang (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Korea); Osvaldo Simeone (New Jersey Institute of Technology, USA); Joonhyuk Kang (KAIST, Korea); Shlomo (Shitz) Shamai (The Technion, Israel)
pp. 10753-10758

Selected Topics 2

Backhaul-Aware Multicell Beamforming for Downlink Cloud Radio Access Network
Binbin Dai and Wei Yu (University of Toronto, Canada)
pp. 10759-10764
Energy-Optimal Partial Computation Offloading using Dynamic Voltage Scaling
Yanting Wang, Min Sheng, Xijun Wang, Liang Wang, Weijia Han, Yan Zhang and Yan Shi (Xidian University, P.R. China)
pp. 10765-10770
Approaches to Adaptively Reduce Processing Effort for LTE Cloud-RAN Systems
Thomas Werthmann (University of Stuttgart, Germany)
pp. 10771-10777
Implementation and Analysis of Forward Error Correction Decoding for Cloud-RAN Systems
Henning Paul and Dirk Wübben (University of Bremen, Germany); Peter Rost (Nokia Networks, Germany)
pp. 10778-10783
Task Assignment Strategies for Pools of Baseband Computation Units in 4G Cellular Networks
Thomas Werthmann (University of Stuttgart, Germany); Heidrun Grob-Lipski (Alcatel-Lucent, Germany); Sebastian Scholz (University of Stuttgart, Germany); Bernd Haberland (Alcatel-Lucent, France)
pp. 10784-10790
Synchronization Challenges in Packet-based Cloud-RAN Fronthaul for Mobile Networks
Aleksandra Checko, Anders Juul, Henrik Christiansen and Michael S. Berger (Technical University of Denmark, Denmark)
pp. 10791-10796

Keynote-3: 5G NOvel Radio Multiservice adaptive network Architecture (5G NORMA)

The key objective of 5G NORMA is to develop a conceptually novel, adaptive and future-proof 5G mobile network architecture. The architecture is enabling unprecedented levels of network customisability, ensuring stringent performance, security, cost and energy requirements to be met; as well as providing an API-driven architectural openness, fuelling economic growth through over-the-top innovation. With 5G NORMA, leading players in the mobile ecosystem aim to underpin Europe's leadership position in 5G.5G NORMA architecture will provide the necessary adaptability able to efficiently handle the diverse requirements and traffic demand fluctuations resulting from heterogeneous and changing service portfolios. Not following the ‘one system fits all services' paradigm of current architectures, 5G NORMA will allow for adapting the mechanisms executed for a given service to the specific service requirements, resulting in a novel service- and context-dependent adaptation of network functions paradigm.The technical approach is based on the innovative concept of adaptive (de)composition and allocation of mobile network functions, which flexibly decomposes the mobile network functions and places the resulting functions in the most appropriate location. By doing so, access and core functions no longer (necessarily) reside in different locations, which is exploited to jointly optimize their operation when possible. The adaptability of the architecture is further strengthened by the innovative software-defined mobile network control and mobile multi-tenancy concepts, and underpinned by corroborating demonstrations.5G NORMA will ensure economic sustainability of network operation and open opportunities for new players, while leveraging the efficiency of the architecture to do so in a cost- and energy- effective way.

Selected Topics 3

Tradeoff between Energy Efficiency and Queues Delay in Heterogeneous Cloud Radio Access Networks
Hongyu Xiang, Yuling Yu, Zhongyuan Zhao and Yong Li (Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, P.R. China); Mugen Peng (Beijing University of posts & Telecommunications, P.R. China)
pp. 10797-10801
Joint Routing and Scheduling in Dense Small Cell Networks using 60GHz backhaul
Emmanouil Pateromichelakis (Huawei Technologies, Germany); Mehrdad Shariat, Atta Ul Quddus and Rahim Tafazolli (University of Surrey, United Kingdom)
pp. 10802-10807
Performance of Cloud Radio Networks with Clustering
Sreejith Thazhathe Veetil (Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, India); Kiran Kuchi (IIT Hyderabad, India); Radha Krishna Ganti (Indian Institute of Technology Madras, India)
pp. 10808-10813

Keynote-4: Advances to Enable Virtualization in Small Cell Networks

One of the areas of discussion in mobile network architecture is the tension between "edge" and "cloud". Over the last decades in mobile networks the powerful trend has been to push intelligence out to the edge, for example with small cell networks. However, recently the opposing trend towards virtualization and the cloud has gained significant traction. The Small Cell Forum has examined the of cost, performance and fronthaul issues of different network architectures which would enable the benefits of small cells to be combined with benefits of virtualization and cloudification.

Keynote-5: Architectural Considerations for C-RAN

The emergence of the C-RAN concept has created a focus for discovery of enabling technologies. The business case for the adoption of these technologies now needs to be explored in the context of various architecture choices to assure market adoption. How may existing architectures evolve to realise the 2020 Network.

Panel: Cloud-Processing in Heterogeneous Mobile Communication Networks

This panel will provide the possibility to discuss with the keynote speaker their views on cloud processing in heterogeneous mobile communication networks.