Cloud-Based Handoff as a Service for Heterogeneous Vehicular Networks with OpenFlow

This paper proposes a cloud-based architecture for enhancing the performance and capacity of vehicular networks of potentially multiple different wireless technologies. The approach addresses the well-known limitations of today´s vehicle-initiated as well as base station-assisted handoff solutions; the former is reactive, therefore slow and inefficient, while the latter is mostly limited to within networks of a single technology. The handoff-as-a-service (HaaS) architecture leverages a cloud system´s abundant computing and data storage resources to establish a database of key network properties and configuration options. By abstracting different networks´ characteristics into a common set of descriptors, the database can aggregate and share properties of networks of different technologies. Leveraging network awareness of a wider scope, the HaaS service can further analyze optimal network configurations considering global efficiency and individual client requirements. The HaaS service in the computing cloud computes optimal handoff strategies on behalf of the vehicles, and OpenFlow is used to control both the vehicle and infrastructure side network interfaces seamlessly across multiple interfaces of different wireless technologies. This paper presents the proposed system architecture, its key components, and how they can be experimentally studied over National Science Foundation´s Global Environment for Network Innovations (GENI) testbed. Experiment results on PC Engine device show the feasibility and advantage of the proposed handoff solution.