AHP and game theory based approach for network selection in heterogeneous wireless networks

Due to the lack of spectrum resources in wireless networks, to efficiently make use of the existing heterogeneous wireless networks is of significant importance. Network selection mechanism plays an important role for mobile users to target a network under the principle “always best connected (ABC)” in heterogeneous wireless environment. In this paper, a novel approach for network selection based on the combination of analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and bankruptcy game which is a special type of an N-person cooperative game is proposed and investigated. The AHP method takes the responsibility of evaluating weights of multiple decision criteria, which depends more on the consideration from the user side. On the other hand, the bankruptcy game is mainly used to assess the potentials of available candidate networks. Finally, the combination of AHP and bankruptcy game evaluates the potential contribution ratio (PCR) of each candidate network and the network with the largest PCR is selected.