Femtocell local breakout management services

• US 9,185,543 B2
• Filed: 08/01/2014
• Issued: 11/10/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 11/21/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I LP (AT&T, Inc.), AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Liu, Cheng P., Faryar, Alireza Farid, Huber, Kurt, Streijl, Robert C., Fowler, Henry Jackson Jr.
• Primary Examiner(s): Behnamian, Shahriar
• Application Number:
  US14/449,890
• Publication Number:
  US 20140342698A1
• Time in Patent Office: 466 Days
• Field of Search: 455/408, 455/432.1, 455/458
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/12 Avoiding congestion; Recovering from congestion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/03 Protocol definition or specification protocol conformance testing H04L1/244
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 Parsing or analysis of headers
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/02 Arrangements for optimising operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/08 Testing, supervising or monitoring using real traffic
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0226 based on location or mobility handoff or reselection H04W36/00; mobile application services making use of the location of users or terminals H04W4/02
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0231 based on communication conditions dynamic wireless traffic scheduling definition based on channel quality criteria H04W72/54
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0268 using specific QoS parameters for wireless networks, e.g. QoS class identifier [QCI] or guaranteed bit rate [GBR] negotiating SLA or negotiating QoS H04W28/24
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0289 Congestion control load shedding arrangements in network planning H04W16/08; performing reselection for handling the traffic H04W36/22; wireless traffic scheduling H04W72/12
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/0967 Quality of Service [QoS] parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 36/0022 for transferring data sessions between adjacent core network technologies
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/24 Accounting or billing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 40/02 Communication route or path selection, e.g. power-based or shortest path routing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 40/248 Connectivity information update
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 56/00 Synchronisation arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 56/001 Synchronization between nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 64/00 Locating users or terminals or network equipment for network management purposes, e.g. mobility management
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/53 based on regulatory allocation policies
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 80/04 Network layer protocols, e.g. mobile IP [Internet Protocol]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/045 : using private Base Stations, e.g. femto Base Stations, home Node B
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/12 : Access point controller devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/16 : Gateway arrangements

Abstract

Management services are provided during local breakout at a femto access point (FAP). In an aspect, the FAP facilitates policy management and employs a policy component to perform an analysis and enforce a set of policies for dynamically selecting an optimal route for traffic received at the FAP based on a decision-making process. Typically, the set of policies can specify different routes based on various factors, such as, but not limited to, type of traffic, current and/or future network resource availability, current time, day and/or date, location of the FAP, location of a UE sending/receiving the traffic, a lowest cost route, and/or route based on cost-benefit, etc. Further, a monitoring component is employed to observe the route employed by that traffic, which can be utilized by various services, such as, billing, Quality of Service, security management, address management, failure management and/or provisioning.

Claims

1. A femto access point device, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory that stores executable instructions that, when executed by the processor, facilitate performance of operations, comprising;

directing communication data, received from a user equipment coupled to the femto access point device, to a device of a local area network coupled to the femto access point device via a route selected based on location data representing a geographical location of the femto access point device, wherein the route is selected from a group of routes comprising a first route that directs the communication data via a backhaul link coupled to the femto access point device and a second route that does not direct the communication data via the backhaul link, and

facilitating a translation of first quality of service class data, assigned to the communication data, to second quality of service class data that is employed by the device during the directing.

2. The femto access point device of claim 1, wherein the route is selected based on preference data associated with the user equipment.

3. The femto access point device of claim 1, wherein the communication data comprises a data packet and the route is selected based on classification data indicative of a classification of the data packet.

4. The femto access point device of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise:

based on the route, updating billing data indicative of a bill associated with the communication data.

5. The femto access point device of claim 4, wherein the updating comprises:

in response to determining that the first route has been selected, updating the billing data based on a first billing rate; and

in response to determining that the second route has been selected, updating the billing data based on a second billing rate different than the first billing rate.

6. The femto access point device of claim 5, wherein the second billing rate is lower than the first billing rate.

7. The femto access point device of claim 5, wherein the first billing rate and the second billing rate are determined based on information received from an operations support system device of a macro network coupled to the femto access point device.

8. The femto access point device of claim 5, wherein the first billing rate and the second billing rate are modified based on network bandwidth data representing a network bandwidth of a macro network device coupled to the femto access point device.

9. The femto access point device of claim 1, wherein the facilitating the translation comprises facilitating the translation based on policy data indicative of a network policy received from a macro network device coupled to the femto access point device.

10. The femto access point device of claim 9, wherein the policy data is first policy data and the facilitating the translation comprises facilitating the translation based on second policy data indicative of a subscriber policy associated with the user equipment.

11. The femto access point device of claim 10, wherein the first policy data is assigned a higher priority than the second policy data.

12. A method, comprising:

based on location data representing a geographical location of a femto access point device comprising a processor, selecting, by the femto access point device, a route from a first route and a second route, wherein the first route directs communication data, received from a user equipment coupled to the femto access point device, to a device of a local area network coupled to the femto access point device via a backhaul link coupled to the femto access point device, and the second route does not direct the communication data via the backhaul link, and

facilitating, by the femto access point device, a conversion of first quality of service class data assigned, by the user equipment to the communication data, to second quality of service class data that is employed by the device during a transmission of the communication data via the route.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising:

in response to determining that the first route has been selected, updating, by the femto access point device, billing data based on a first billing rate; and

in response to determining that the second route has been selected, updating, by the femto access point device, the billing data based on a second billing rate different than the first billing rate.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

receiving, by the femto access point device, rate data indicative of the first billing rate and the second billing rate from a network device of a macro network coupled to the femto access point device.

15. The method of claim 13, further comprising:

modifying, by the femto access point device, the first billing rate based on network bandwidth data representing a network bandwidth of a macro network device coupled to the femto access point device.

16. The method of claim 12, wherein the facilitating comprises facilitating the conversion based on policy data indicative of a network policy received from a macro network device coupled to the femto access point device.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the policy data is first policy data and the facilitating comprises facilitating the conversion based on second policy data indicative of a subscriber policy associated with the user equipment, wherein the first policy data is assigned a higher priority than the second policy data.

18. A computer-readable storage device comprising executable instructions that, in response to execution, cause a femto access point device comprising a processor to perform operations, comprising:

facilitating a transmission of communication data, received from a user equipment coupled to the femto access point device, to a device of a local area network coupled to the femto access point device via a route that is selected based on location data representing a geographical location of the femto access point device, wherein the route is selected from a set of routes comprising a first route that directs the communication data via a backhaul link coupled to the femto access point device and a second route that does not direct the communication data via the backhaul link, and

facilitating a mapping between first quality of service class data assigned, by the user equipment to the communication data, and second quality of service class data that is employed by the device during the directing.

19. The computer-readable storage device of claim 18, wherein the operations further comprise:

based on the route, updating billing data indicative of a bill associated with communication data.

20. The computer-readable storage device of claim 19, wherein the updating comprises updating the billing data based on a billing rate associated with the route that is determined based on network bandwidth data representing a network bandwidth of a macro network coupled to the femto access point device.