System and method for managing spectrum allocation

• US 8,583,157 B2
• Filed: 06/22/2012
• Issued: 11/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/29/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Spectrum Bridge, Inc.
• Inventors: Stanforth, Peter, Camchong, Mario A., Hari, Santosh
• Primary Examiner(s): DEAN, RAYMOND S
• Application Number:
  US13/530,163
• Publication Number:
  US 20120258753A1
• Time in Patent Office: 508 Days
• Field of Search: 455/450, 455/509, 455/512, 370/329
• US Class Current: 455/509
• CPC Class Codes: H04H 20/42 Arrangements for resource management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 16/14 Spectrum sharing arrangements between different networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/00 Supervisory, monitoring or testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/00 Local resource management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/56 based on priority criteria

Abstract

Disclosed are techniques for managing situations where spectrum use by one party is preempted by spectrum needs of another party. A revocation may be sent from a spectrum management system to secondary radio systems that are impacted by the presence of priority radio system. Remedial action may be taken if an acknowledgement of the revocation message is not received from a secondary radio system. Also, the secondary radio systems may transmit keep-alive messages to monitor operation of the communication pathway for the revocation messages.

Claims

1. A spectrum management system for radio systems, comprising:

an interface to communicate with the radio systems over a network; and

a processor that executes a spectrum allocation function that is stored in a memory and, by execution of the spectrum allocation function, the spectrum management system is configured to;

provide an original spectrum certificate to a secondary radio system, the original spectrum certificate defining spectrum that is available for use by the secondary radio system for wireless communications;

receive data indicating that a priority radio system having spectrum use rights that dominate spectrum use rights of the secondary radio system has a need for spectrum;

determine that the ability of the secondary radio system to use some of the spectrum defined by the original spectrum certificate is impacted by the priority radio system due to location of the secondary radio system and potential contention with operation of the priority radio system;

modify the original spectrum certificate to specify one of alternative spectrum or revoke a portion of the spectrum defined by the original spectrum certificate, the modification to the original spectrum certificate being a change in the spectrum certificate that permits continued operation under the spectrum certificate by the secondary radio system;

communicate with the impacted secondary radio system to free spectrum from the impacted secondary radio system for use by the priority radio system, wherein the communication is transmission of the modified spectrum certificate to the impacted secondary radio system; and

determine if an acknowledgement is received from the secondary radio system in response to the modified spectrum certificate within a predetermined amount of time from transmission of the modified spectrum certificate and, if not, take action to preclude overlapping spectrum use by the priority radio system and the secondary radio system.

2. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein the change in the spectrum certificate is a specification of alternative spectrum for use by the secondary radio system during an exception period that gave rise to the impact on the secondary radio system.

3. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein the spectrum certificate contains a channel map identifying available channels from a plurality of predetermined channels and the communication changes the spectrum certificate to indicate that one or more previously available channels are not available.

4. The spectrum management system of claim 3, wherein the secondary radio system is a television whitespace band (TVBD) radio and the channels in the spectrum certificate are television whitespace channels.

5. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein the spectrum certificate is generated as a result of matching spectrum needs of the secondary radio system with available spectrum from a spectrum holder.

6. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein the spectrum management system is further configured to receive a keep-alive message from the secondary radio system and transmit an acknowledgement in response to each keep-alive message.

7. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein the determination includes establishing an area of impact of the priority radio system and identifying that the secondary radio system is located in the area of impact.

8. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein if the acknowledgement is not received in the predetermined amount of time, the spectrum management system plans spectrum use of the priority radio system around the secondary radio system from which the acknowledgement is not received.

9. The spectrum management system of claim 1, wherein if the acknowledgement is not received in the predetermined amount of time, the spectrum management system alerts a user.

10. The spectrum management system of claim 9, wherein the user is associated with the secondary radio system and is prompted to manually turn off the secondary radio system.