Radio Resource Sharing as a service in 5G: A software-defined networking approach

The rise of heterogeneity in technology, types of services, and coverage area of radio access in the Fifth Generation (5G) wireless communication, opens new challenges in optimising users’ access to the networks. To fully utilise the capacity of such rich field of wireless connectivity, mobile devices can not any more be confined with accessing only their previously agreed home operator’s infrastructure. On the other hand, and in order to keep up with the agility required to deliver promises in providing new services and applications, virtualization and softwarization are introduced in the 5G. To this end, we propose an on-the-fly Radio Resource Sharing (RRS) scheme between different mobile infrastructures so as to provide mobile devices with the freedom to access all available radio resources around them. Such on-the-fly RRS is empowered by employing the concepts of Software-defined Networking (SDN) and virtualization of radio access resources. We argue that the RRS service is a step forwards in achieving the convergence as foreseen by the 5G: convergence of SDN, virtualization, and wireless control, convergence of heterogeneous wireless infrastructure, and above all, convergence of different operators’ infrastructure in a transparent manner. © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.