Photonics in Switching 2015: Invited Papers
SDN solutions for 5G transport networks
Paola Iovanna
Ericsson Research
Ericsson SPA
Pisa, Italy
paola.iovanna@ericsson.com
Abstract— This paper presents the impact of 5G on transport
with related features and challenging issues. An SDN solution is
proposed with some relevant performance results.
Keywords—SDN, NFV, Cloud, 5G
I. INTRODUCTION
The evolution to 5G system and services is a key enabler of
the networked society paradigm where all persons and things
will be connected everywhere, every time, using any type of
devices and technology. The mobility, that has fundamental
role, requires an innovative and tight interworking with the
transport to provide E2E connectivity on demand. In addition
the transport network is extending towards the antenna to allow
efficient centralization of processing functions. The combined
use of Cloud, Network Function Virtualization and software-
defined networking (SDN) paradigms should allow creating
new services in very quick time and in programmable way
[1,2]. The transport network, composed by heterogeneous
domains, should interwork with the radio in very efficient way
to meet cloud enabled network principle. A solution to dial
with these topics is presented and some relevant results
obtained by simulation on relevant network scenario are
reported.
II. 5G SYSTEMS AND SERVICES DESCRIPTION
5G systems and services are key cornerstone for realizing
the "Networked Society" paradigm that is based on the
principle of allowing access to information and data sharing in
each connectivity status and location. Actually the
development of new services such as, for example, "Internet of
Things" (IoT), Machine Type Communications (MTC) based
on devices such as vehicular, utility, sensors, "Tactile Internet",
will require the availability of a comprehensive connectivity
that can ensure the use of the various services at any time,
environment and condition independently which is the specific
device and the available access technology. In this context,
mobility is an essential ingredient to allow seamless
connectivity in space, in time and in any medium. Moreover it
should be possible to request a supply of personalized services
specific to the needs of various users in various fields of
applications ranging from the world of medicine to that of
security. 5G solutions, therefore, not only require mobile
connectivity for people, but will extend to any type of device, if
you enable the creation of new applications and "use cases"
including "wearables" and "smart homes" services, and
industrial applications of various kinds. In this context, unlike
978-1-4799-8821-1/15/$31.00 ©2015 IEEE
Fabio Ubaldi
Ericsson Research
Ericsson SPA
Pisa, Italy
fabio.ubaldi@ericsson.com
previous generations 5G wireless access will not be seen as a
specific radio access technology, but rather as an access
solution that enables mobile communications for the
foreseeable future and beyond 2020. In such a scenario it is
expected a huge increase of traffic. Actually the transmission
speed of the services will increase by several orders of
magnitude ranging from tens to hundred compared to the
current ones, and the service that will develop into urban areas
particularly dense will increase the traffic density for area of
one thousand times more. Moreover the number of connected
devices will increase by orders of magnitude ranging from ten
to hundred. It shall be possible to support applications that
require ultra-fast response times, such as, for example, the
"tactile internet" services for which the "End-to-End" latency
should be less than 5 ms.
III. TRANSPORT NETWORK REQUIREMENTS FOR 5G SUPPORT
The traditional transport networks, based on a vertical
architecture, were essentially designed to be applied to the
provision of individual services with predictable traffic over
time. The resulting architecture, however, is ill-suited to the
change of user demand and to satisfy requirements of the
challenging use cases emerging. Main limit is to minimize both
the time of supply of services and their cost in order to deliver
and manage services at very low cost while ensuring an
adequate level of quality. 5G networks require a complete
different model where the service provisioning processes is
automated and simplified by software programming the
network. That requires coordinating resources located in the
"cloud" for complex dynamic systems with high level and
differentiated quality. Given the growing demand for dynamic
service level agreements (SLA), the network needs to play a
more active role where the orchestration capabilities of E2E
type has the fundamental task of placing the functions of
virtualized network resources that are physically close to
various users.
A. Cloud, NFV and SDN role
In principle Cloud technologies in conjunction with the
SDN and NFV provide tools enabling the creation of
infrastructure with a higher level of abstraction with the great
advantage to significantly increase the degree of flexibility
network. Substantially Cloud, SDN and NFV allow the
creation of horizontal architectures which can be combined
(chained) together quickly and easily through an adequate level
of programmability and virtualization, so to provide services in
a scalable, fast and easily adaptable to various use cases. NFV,
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 Photonics in Switching 2015: Invited Papers
separating hardware from software, allows network functions
to be implemented as programmable instead of via real
hardware. This ability allows providing on demand services at
scale. Thanks to virtualization, in fact, the greatest benefit of
the paradigm NFV is the flexibility to perform the network
functions independently where they are geographically located.
As a result, the same function network can be carried out in
different locations. Based on the specific use case, a network
function may be performed in a data center (DC) or in
proximity to a radio base station. Depending on the
geographical location of where the function is positioned in the
network there may be different latency values. This is one of
the critical aspects to consider in the evolution of networks. On
the one hand, the centralization of many functions by
concentrating them in data centers have the advantage of a
reduction in operating costs, consolidate the number of nodes
and reduce power consumption. On the other hand, however,
the stringent latency requirements and low cost that the new
services require, push to place certain functions in proximity of
base stations. It will be reasonable consider hybrid architecture
where DC locations will be placed in geographical distant areas
that must be interconnected by crossing transport network.
B. Fronthaul and SDN model
A relevant transformation of the transport network with
respect the current network organization is the presence of new
segments such as the fronthaul. The key principle is to split the
radio base stations, geographically distributed to provide radio
coverage, in remote radio unit (RRU) and BaseBand unit
(BBU). A RRU executes Radio Frequency (RF) functionalities
of a base station, while the BBU handles base band processing
functions. These processing functions are physically or
virtually centralized in BBU pools and located in sites that can
be easily managed. This splitting of functions allows
simplifying the RRU and taking advantage of centralization of
processing functions in terms of reduction of expenditure cost
and increasing the level of radio coordination where it is
necessary. The fronthaul is the transport network that provides
and manages the connectivity among the RRUs pool and the
BBU clusters. Considering the high amount of bandwidth
required from 5G services one of the more promising
technology to realize such network is the optical. Actually it
could be reasonable to consider network scenario where the
optical technology is moved towards the antenna. In order to
meet low cost requirements, the control of the fronthaul should
assure a dynamic and efficient transport resource usage
enabling load balancing and reducing power consumption.
SDN paradigm is in principle a good candidate for the
fronthaul control and it seems a natural solution to meet 5G
network requirements. Anyway the SDN solution for fronthaul
network is not well defined architecture due to the fact that
such network segment presents peculiar characteristics in terms
of cost, power consumption and capillarity of the network
elements that are distributed on the geographical area. Actually
fronthaul network segment presents characteristics that differ
with respect the aggregation and core network segment where
SDN paradigm is a more consolidated approach. In most of
cases the fronthaul network could be based on simple topology
such as hub and spoke in order to limit the number of
intermediate nodes to be crossed and meet very low latency
requirement. In such simplified topology in –band signaling
could be considered for node configuration instead to realize
dedicate signaling network. Anyway there are the peculiar
functions that push to define an SDN control also in this
segment. In order to meet high amount of bandwidth
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requirements of 5G services, the optical is a very promising
technology for the data plane. Anyway alternative technology
should be considered. For example where the fiber is not
available microwave technology is a valid alternative. For such
reason SDN model is a good solution to enable a control
technology agnostic. Moreover multi-vendor support of the
transport could be supported in order to exploit existing
infrastructures and installed fibers from operators. In addition,
in the fronthaul, it is relevant to provide clear demarcation
points between radio and transport to cope with QoS, O&M,
Synchronization and Security. Actually this allows keeping
radio and transport decoupled and simplifying the maintenance
operation by clear localization of faults, and responsibility.
Moreover another relevant feature is support multi-operator
scenarios that allow reducing the cost of transport
infrastructure by sharing the transport infrastructure among
different operators.
C. SDN solution for Multi-domain transport
According to 5G system, as described by NGMN [3], the radio,
transport and cloud should interwork in very tight and efficient
way as a unique infrastructure able to provide service to the
upper layer. Actually the objective is to enable the creation of
5G service in programmable way using radio, network and
cloud as a single infrastructure.
Fig. 1. Reference architecture for multi-domain SDN controller
As shown in Figure 1, the transport is not a homogenous
entity but it is composed by heterogeneous domains that could
differ for technology, control, and vendor. SDN paradigm
should in principle solve this problem but in most cases the
migration to SDN control of the transport domains could be
performed step by step; hence it is a common scenario that
SDN transport domains should interwork with legacy domains.
Moreover, even in case of all transport domains are based on
SDN, the multi-domain interaction presents some open issues
to be fixed. One of the key aspects is to combine two opposite
objectives: provide a simplified and stable abstract view of the
multi domain transport for cloud and radio cross layer
interworking, with an optimize use of the transport resource. In
facts reduction of transport cost is very relevant [4], and this
requires limiting the over-provisioning of the resources. In [5]
a SDN solution for multi-domain transport is presented in order
to deal with heterogeneous domains. Figure 1 shows the
architecture in case the multi-domains transport should provide
suitable connectivity services for 5G scenario. The radio FH
orchestrator is in charge to handle the function with the limited
scope between RRU and BBU, while the E2E multi-domain
 Photonics in Switching 2015: Invited Papers
orchestrator handles all the connectivity services regarding the
E2E transport network where other radio and cloud functions
are located. The key principle is based on decoupling the
operations done at E2E level on a suitable abstraction view of
the transport resources, with respect to the operations done at
single domain level that could be very time consuming and
tightly dependent on the specific technology an control. As
shown in Figure 1 a local virtualizer provides a list of physical
paths to the E2E Orchestrator that summarizes them in virtual
links connecting the border node of each domain and translate
them in a common language that is the service parameters such
as the latency, the peak bandwidth, the guaranteed bandwidth,
the delay, etc. This allows performing in advance the resource
optimization of each domain according the policy and
capability of each domain. Moreover that hierarchical approach
limits the interworking among the domains enabling the
possibility to add, remove, or change a domain as a plug and
play operation. After the local virtualizer abstracts a single
domain, the E2E orchestrator exposes all the abstract views in
the E2E abstract topology with service parameters. In this
sense there is a suitable modeling of the transport resources
that allows linking the control of the transport with the service
representation in smart way. As shown in the picture the
transport resources are sliced in several representations views
for each different tenant o service type with complete
separation between the service layer and the transport layer.
When a connectivity service request arrives, the system
provides real time the E2E connectivity considering the
available resources in the E2E abstract view and in agnostic
way respect to the technology specific parameters. When the
E2E path has been selected, each local virtualizer selects the
corresponding physical path for the virtual link. This is a very
important operation because allows optimizing the resource
usage in the domain but at the same time limits frequently
changes in the E2E virtual view. The choice of abstraction
parameters is relevant at this regard. For example given a list of
physical paths, the exposed bandwidth in the E2E virtual view
is that one of the path with the maximum bandwidth value.
This allows increasing the probability to accept a request at
E2E level. Anyway when the virtualizer selects the physical
path, it chose the path with minimum bandwidth that can meet
the requests in order to limit the times that the exposed
parameter changes. In order to make the E2E path computation
dynamic respect the unpredicted service requests, a smart
mechanism has been defined. The mechanism monitors how
the resources of each domain are used and correlates to the
other. If necessary it commands the local virtualizer to require
the single domain to rearrange the internal routing and change
the domain abstraction accordingly. Each domain receives the
re-configuration requests in independent and transparent way
with respect the other domains. In [6] detailed simulations and
analysis have been performed in relevant network scenario to
demonstrate the importance of such mechanisms. In terms of
resource optimization the solution has been compared with an
ideal solution where all information is known in advance and
the traffic matrix is fixed. The proposed solution allows serving
an amount of requests that ranges from 90% - to 98% with
respect the ideal cases. The simulation, performed in a relevant
scenario provided by Telefonica, has been carried on
considering different traffic matrices. Moreover another key
feature is the capability to support bandwidth elasticity on
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demand. Especially when different technologies interwork the
elasticity capabilities are very different and it is important
providing a solution to optimize the resource usage. In [5] a
mechanism has been defined that allows to represent in the
virtualized E2E view the elasticity and simulation analysis on
relevant use cases demonstrated that the solution is able to
follow the traffic. In Figure 2 the performances are reported for
the proposed solution and a solution without elasticity support.
Three traffic profiles are defined: “Low Traffic”, “Medium
Traffic” and “High Traffic” where respectively about 20%,
50% and 80% of network resources are used on average.
Fig. 2. “Elastic” vs “not elastic” solution comparison
Two classes of services are considered: the gold class
where the peak value is booked in the network at the first time
the service enter, and the silver class where the booked
bandwidth is the guaranteed value. Each service modifies the
bandwidth value on demand up to the peak value. As shown in
Figure 2, in case of medium and high traffic load the proposed
solution allows to service 50% and 70 % respectively.
IV. CONCLUSION
The paper describe problems and challenges of transport to
support 5G service and system and describe a solution that is
able to optimize the resource usage comparable to ideal
solutions, support elasticity on demand of the bandwidth
improving up to 70% of more served traffic with a suitable
architecture that provides agnostic virtual view with service
parameters.
REFERENCES
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research challenges” IEEE Communications Magazine, Vol. 47,
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[2] Network Functions Virtualization (NFV); Architectural Framework,
ETSI GS NFV 002, 01-2015
[3] NGMN 5G white paper , February 17, 2015
[4] D. Mcdysan, Software defined networking opportunities for transport,
IEEE Communications Magazine, Vol. 51, Issue 3, March 2013
[5] P.Iovanna, F. Ubaldi, T. Pepe, L. M. Contreras, V. Lopez, J.P.
Fernandez-Palacios Gimenez ”Main Challenges on WAN due to NFV
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Routing”, Invited paper ONDM, May 2015.
[6] P. Iovanna, F. Ubaldi, F. Di Michele, J.P. Fernandez-Palacios Gimenez,
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