Network Slicing: Considerations on the implementation of data, control, and management planes

Abstract:
5G mobile networks are expected to serve vertical industries with business-specifically tailored communications solutions. Potential application areas include e.g. education, eHealth as well as transportation, automation and smart grids. For efficiency reasons, multiple services need to be carried on a common network infrastructure, which must be highly flexible to meet the variety of heterogeneous business needs. Network slicing can offer this flexibility, provided it is applied in an end-to-end manner as proposed by the EU H2020 project 5G NORMA. So far, mostly the application of network slicing to the core network has been studied. This paper describes how network slicing can be implemented also in the RAN. Furthermore, it discusses the impacts of network slicing and multi-tenancy on the management and orchestration layer.