SDN based Evolved Packet Core architecture for efficient user mobility support

In current generation LTE networks, user mobility leads to high levels of signaling traffic from the eNodeB (Evolved Node B) to the Evolved Packet Core (EPC) for maintaining the GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP) and Proxy Mobile IPv6 (PMIPv6) tunnel. Further, the presence of Packet Gateway (PGW) at the network edge introduces additional delay for every signaling procedure. In this paper, we propose an improved EPC architecture based on Software Defined Networking (SDN) concepts. This architecture (logically) centralizes the control plane functionality of EPC thereby eliminating the use of mobility management protocols and reducing mobility related signaling costs. The architecture utilizes the global network view feature of SDN for mobility management. The proposed architecture has been implemented in the ns-3 simulator framework. The results quantify the performance of the proposed architecture in terms of signaling cost, tunneling cost, handover latency and scalability.