OpenFlow as an Architecture for e-Node B Virtualization

The ability to enable multiple virtual networks on common infrastructure with different network architectures has been gaining critical importance recently mainly because this kind of sharing does not incur any additional equipment cost for operators. An aim of our ongoing research is to take pragmatic approach towards infrastructure sharing applying operator differentiation and provide a solution to improve traffic prioritization primarily for 4G-LTE mobile networks. We propose a novel solution to the same, based on exploring OpenFlow as an architecture for e-Node B virtualization. By demonstrating the feasibility of adapting the existing OpenFlow mechanism to mobile network architecture, we illustrate the evolution of network sharing via an open network approach, based on OpenFlow. With OpenFlow, we seek to define how far it can be gone within the sharing scenarios based on the architecture of LTE/EPC defined in 3GPP, where the key lock is to open facilities to define flexible and extensible policies.