CP-SDN: A New Approach for the Control Operation of 5G Mobile Networks to Improve QoS

Abstract

Today, the Software Defined Network (SDN) technology gives more efficiency and flexibility to the 5G mobile networks that are expected to support an enormous amount of data relating to various constrained services. The 5G network should implement newer approaches and technologies that allow supporting the scalability and mobility of the network. The SDN approach consists of decoupling between the control operation and the networking operation, where the control operation is held by the SDN controller that is responsible for defining the management and the control rules. Data forwarding is performed by switches that apply rules defined by their controllers. In the current study, we have proposed and defined a new approach named CP-SDN: Cooperative Protocol-SDN, as an extension to the existing Software Defined Networks, especially when the network experiences saturation due to the huge amount of exchanged data. This congestion may affect the constrained flow and leads to an undesired delay that affects the network Quality of Service (QoS). CP-SDN consists of a cooperation technique between neighboring controllers that aims to relieve the congested centers and redirect the extra flow through neighbors. CP-SDN processing keeps controller databases updated and assures the optimized path for the extra flow when network congestion occurs. The performed simulations on calculating the e-Mbb and M-iOT delay performances for various probability densities show that CP-SDN brings more reliability and efficiency in reducing the transmission delay and overcome the existing SDN scheme. This makes it a prime candidate for the evolved high scalable 5G networks.