Provision of Position Information in Telecommunications Networks

• US 20090156201A1
• Filed: 01/10/2007
• Published: 06/18/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/12/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Vodafone Group Services Limited (Vodafone Group PLC)
• Original Assignee: Vodafone Group Services Limited (Vodafone Group PLC)
• Inventors: Pudney, Christopher David, Watson, John Mahony
• Granted Patent: US 8,238,901 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/426.100
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management

Abstract

A mobile or cellular telecommunications network includes a plurality of terminals which are registered. The terminal may be fixed in position, such as a terminal in a vending machine. Alternatively, the terminal may be fixed to a vehicle used for sending an SOS message when the vehicle is involved in an accident. The terminal may be immobile, and therefore does not need to continually advise the network of its location. The terminal may not receive incoming calls or other communications. The terminals therefore may not require paging by the network. In the embodiments described, such terminals are assigned a special terminal type identifier which indicates to the network that these terminals do not require paging. The way in which the network interacts with the terminals is adjusted so that signaling to perform location updates is eliminated or at least reduced.

Claims

1. A mobile or cellular telecommunications network, comprising:

a plurality of telecommunications terminals which are registered with the network, each of the terminals being operable to signal a position to the network, and wherein the network instructs at least one of the terminals to signal the position at a time in dependence upon an identity of the terminal.

2. The network of claim 1, further comprising:

means for paging each terminal in accordance with the signalled position of the terminal.

3. The network of claim 2, further comprising:

means for assigning an identifier to at least one selected terminal in dependence upon the frequency with which paging of the selected terminal is likely to be required.

4. The network of claim 3, wherein said identifier is assigned to ones of the terminals with a relatively low expected paging frequency.

5. The network of claim 3, wherein said at least one selected terminal is expected to be relatively immobile.

6. The network of claim 3, wherein at least one selected terminal is expected to receive relatively few incoming calls.

7. The network of claim 1, wherein said time is at least one of:

a selected time of day and a date.

11. The network of claim 1, wherein the network includes a radio access network which comprises a plurality of geographically distributed cells, respective groups of said cells being allocated to respective regions by the network.

12. The network of claim 1, wherein the signalled position is the region occupied by the at least one terminal.

13. The network of claim 12, wherein the region is a location area.

14. The network of claim 13, wherein the position is signalled by performing a location area update.

15. The network of claim 12, wherein the region is a routing area.

16. The network of claim 15, wherein the position is signalled by performing a routing area update.

8. A mobile or cellular telecommunications network, comprising:

a plurality of telecommunications terminals which are registered with the network, each of the terminals being operable to signal a position to the network for facilitating paging of each terminal by the network, wherein at least one terminal is provided with an identifier that is indicative of the frequency with which said paging is likely to be required, and wherein the identifier is used by the network to control the interaction between the network and the at least one terminal.

9. The network of claim 8, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control when the at least one terminal is detached from the network.

10. The network of claims 8, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control when records of the at least one terminal are purged from elements of the network.

17. The network of claim 8, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control the attach and/or detach signaling of the at least one terminal.

18. A method of operating a mobile or cellular telecommunications network with which a plurality of telecommunications terminals are registered, each of the terminals being operable to signal a position to the network, the method comprising:

instructing at least one of the terminals to signal the position at a time in dependence upon an identity of the terminal.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

paging each terminal in accordance with the signalled position of the terminal.

20. The method of claim 19, further comprising:

assigning an identifier to at least one selected terminal in dependence upon a frequency with which paging of the at least one selected terminal is likely to be required.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein said identifier is assigned to ones of the terminals with a relatively low expected paging frequency.

22. The method of claim 20, wherein said at least one selected terminal is expected to be relatively immobile.

23. The method of claim 20, wherein at least one selected terminal is expected to receive relatively few incoming calls.

24. The method of claim 18, wherein said time is at least one of:

a selected time of day and a date.

28. The method of claim 18, wherein the network includes a radio access network which comprises a plurality of geographically distributed cells, and wherein respective groups of said cells are allocated to respective regions by the network.

29. The method of claim 18, wherein the signalled position is the region occupied by the terminal.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein the region is a location area.

31. The method of claim 29, wherein the position is signalled by performing a location area update.

32. The method of claim 29, wherein the region is a routing area.

33. The method of claim 32, wherein the position is signalled by performing a routing area update.

25. A method of operating a mobile or cellular telecommunications network with which a plurality of telecommunications terminals are registered, each of the terminals being operable to signal a position to the network for facilitating paging of each terminal by the network, the method comprising:

providing at least one terminal with an identifier that is indicative of the frequency with which said paging is likely to be required; and

controlling the interaction between the network and the at least one terminal in dependence upon the identifier.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control when the at least one terminal is detached from the network.

27. The method of claims 25, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control when records of the at least one terminal are purged from elements of the network.

34. The method of claim 25, wherein the identifier is used by the network to control the attach/detach signaling of the at least one terminal.