Systems and methods for load balancing in cellular networks and wireless local area networks

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9559866-B2
Application number	US-201113333381-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 21, 2011
Priority date	Dec 21, 2011
Publication date	Jan 31, 2017
Grant date	Jan 31, 2017

Abstract

Network operators are striving to find ways to provide stable video services amid a rapid increase in video data traffic. In order to provide stable video services with constrained network resources, network operators attempted to deploy multiple communication networks in parallel. However, network operators failed to effectively balance data traffic across parallel communication networks. This disclosure provides systems and methods for effectively balancing data traffic across parallel communication networks.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method comprising:
receiving, at a network device in communication with a cellular network and a wireless local area network (WLAN), a cellular network condition message that includes first data load information associated with one or more base stations in the cellular network, wherein the one or more base stations are capable of providing network service to a user equipment, wherein the first data load information is indicative of an amount of data traffic handled by the one or more base stations in the cellular network;
receiving, at the network device, a WLAN condition message that includes second data load information associated with one or more access points in the WLAN, wherein the one or more access points are capable of providing network service to the user equipment, wherein the second data load information is indicative of an amount of data traffic handled by the one or more access points in the WLAN; and
when the user equipment is attached to one of the cellular network or the WLAN, causing, by the network device, the first data load information associated with the one or more base stations and the second data load information associated with the one or more access points to be sent to the user equipment over the one of the cellular network or the WLAN to which the user equipment is attached, thereby providing the user equipment with the first data load information and the second data load information when the user equipment is attached to only one of the cellular network or the WLAN, wherein the cellular network and the WLAN comprise different wireless technologies, and wherein the network device is a central node to be coupled to both the cellular network and to the WLAN and provide data load information associated with the one or more base stations to the WLAN and data load information associated with the one or more access points to the cellular network.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points that are capable of providing the network service to the user equipment, wherein the identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points includes:
if the user equipment is attached to the cellular network,
identifying a serving base station that is serving the user equipment;
identifying a physical location of candidate base stations and candidate access points; and
determining, based on the physical location of the candidate base stations and the candidate access points, which of the candidate base stations and the candidate access points has a service area that overlaps with that of the serving base station.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points that capable of providing the network service to the user equipment, wherein the identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points includes:
if the user equipment is attached to the WLAN,
identifying a serving access point that is serving the user equipment;
identifying a physical location of candidate base stations and candidate access points; and
determining, based on the physical location of the candidate base stations and the candidate access points, which of the candidate base stations and the candidate access points has a service area that overlaps with that of the serving access point.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points that are capable of providing the network service to the user equipment, wherein the identifying the one or more base stations and the one or more access points includes:
if the user equipment is attached to the cellular network,
identifying a physical location of the user equipment; and
determining which of candidate base stations and candidate access points has a service area that includes the physical location of the user equipment.

5. The method of claim 2 , wherein the cellular network condition message includes physical location identifier information associated with the base station, wherein the WLAN condition message includes physical location identifier information associated with the access point, further wherein identifying the physical location of the candidate base stations and the candidate access points includes retrieving, from the cellular network condition message, the physical location identifier associated with the candidate base stations and retrieving, from the WLAN condition message, the physical location identifier associated with the candidate access points.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein causing the first data load information associated with the one or more base stations and the second data load information associated with the one or more access points to be sent to the user equipment includes sending, to a WLAN controller, the first data load information and the second data load information.

7. The method of claim 6 , further comprising sending, to the user equipment, the first data load information associated with the one or more base stations as a Quality of Service Basic Service Set (QBSS) load element.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein causing the first data load information associated with the one or more base stations and the second data load information associated with the one or more access points to be sent to the user equipment includes sending the first data load information and the second data load information to an access network discovery and selection function (ANDSF).

9. The method of claim 8 , further comprising sending, from the ANDSF to the user equipment, the first data load information and the second data load information.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first data load information and the second data load information includes an amount of additional data traffic that can be handled by each of the one or more base stations and the one or more access points.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the data load information associated with the one or more access points in the WLAN that is provided to the cellular network comprises an indication of the total number of user equipments (UEs) currently associated with an access point.

12. The method of claim 1 , further comprising, before causing the first data load information and the second data load information to be sent to the user equipment:
filtering out, by the network device, data load information of one or more base stations that are not candidate base stations for the user equipment to produce the first data load information; and
filtering out, by the network device, data load information of one or more access points that are not candidate access points for the user equipment to produce the second data load information.

13. A network device comprising:
one or more interfaces configured to provide communication with a mobility management entity (MME), a wireless local area network (WLAN) controller, and an access network discovery and selection function; and
a processor, in communication with the one or more interfaces, and configured to run a module stored in memory that is configured to:
identify first data load information associated with one or more base stations and second data load information associated with one or more access points that are capable of providing network service to a user equipment, wherein the first data load information is indicative of an amount of data traffic handled by the one or more base stations, and wherein the second data load information is indicative of an amount of data traffic handled by the one or more access poin

Assignees

• Grayson Mark
• Shatzkamer Kevin
• Cisco Tech Inc

Inventors

• Grayson Mark
• Shatzkamer Kevin

Classifications

• H04L41/12

  Discovery or management of network topologies · CPC title

• H04L43/0876

  Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level · CPC title

• H04L12/5692 Primary

  Selection among different networks · CPC title

• H04W76/025

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H04W76/15

  Setup of multiple wireless link connections · CPC title