Maximizing Service Provider Utility in a Heterogeneous Wireless Ad-Hoc Network

• US 20110019627A1
• Filed: 05/25/2010
• Published: 01/27/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 05/26/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Inventors: Suri, Atul, Krishnaswamy, Dilip
• Granted Patent: US 9,179,367 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/329
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/14 Charging , metering or billing arrangements for data wireline or wireless communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/145 trading network capacity or selecting route based on tariff
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1485 Tariff-related aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1489 dependent on congestion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0896 Bandwidth or capacity management, i.e. automatically increasing or decreasing capacities flow or congestion control using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation, H04L47/76
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/22 comprising specially adapted graphical user interfaces [GUI]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5003 Managing SLA; Interaction between SLA and QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/00 Arrangements for metering, time-control or time indication ; Metering, charging or billing arrangements for voice wireline or wireless communications, e.g. VoIP
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/55 for hybrid networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/58 based on statistics of usage or network monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/80 Rating or billing plans; Tariff determination aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/8027 based on network load situation
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/0188 Network monitoring; statistics on usage on called/calling number
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/2046 Hybrid network
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/74 Rating aspects, e.g. rating parameters or tariff determination apects
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/7428 Load situation, e.g. Current network load, traffic load or available resources
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 28/20 Negotiating bandwidth
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/24 Accounting or billing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/22 with access to wired networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/04 adapted for relaying to or from another terminal or user

Abstract

An ad-hoc service provider is configured to support a wireless connection to the network. The ad-hoc service provider is further configured to provide access to the network for one or more mobile clients. The one or more mobile clients are configured to select the ad-hoc service provider based on at least one parameter related to the ad-hoc service provider'"'"'s ability to support the wireless connection. The ad-hoc service provider is further configured to allocate bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients based on at least one parameter related to the effect on the ad-hoc service provider for providing such bandwidth.

Claims

1. An ad-hoc service provider, comprising:

a processing system configured to support a wireless connection to a network, the processing system being further configured to provide access to the network for one or more mobile clients and to allocate bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients for accessing the network based on at least one parameter related to the effect on the ad-hoc service provider for providing such access, wherein the processing system comprises a user interface configured to provide a user with access to the network through the processing system.

2. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises revenue generated by the ad-hoc service provider for the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients.

3. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises energy required by the ad-hoc service provider to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients.

4. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises loss of bandwidth that would otherwise be available to the user to access the network.

5. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises processing resources required by the processing system to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients.

6. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises a quality of service or goodness metric.

7. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein processing system is further configured to determine the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients by maximizing a utility function that is a function of said at least one parameter, the utility function being maximized when the derivative of the utility function is zero.

8. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 7 wherein said at least one parameter comprises revenue generated by the ad-hoc service provider for the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients, energy required by the ad-hoc service provider to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients, loss of bandwidth that would otherwise be available to the user to access the network, processing resources required by the processing system to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients, and a quality of service or goodness metric.

9. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 8 wherein the processing system is further configured to determine the revenue for a session by maximizing the utility function.

10. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 8 wherein the processing system is further configured to maximize the utility function by weighting the energy required by the ad-hoc service provider by a weighting factor that is a function of energy available to the ad-hoc service provider.

11. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 10 wherein the energy factor is an increasing step function, linear function, or sigmoidal function of a current energy state of the ad-hoc service provider.

12. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 9 wherein one or more of said at least one parameters comprises a linear function.

13. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 9 wherein one or more of said at least one parameters comprises a sigmoidal function.

14. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 7 wherein the processing system is further configured to compute an availability function for the ad-hoc service provider, and to terminate service to said at least one of the one or more mobile clients as a function of the utility function and the availability function.

15. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 14 wherein the processing system is further configured to terminate the service to said at least one of the one or more mobile clients by handing off said at least one of the one or more mobile clients to another ad-hoc service provider.

16. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 14 wherein the availability function comprises a step function between an available state and an unavailable state.

17. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 14 wherein the availability function comprises a decreasing function from an available state to an unavailable state.

18. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 14 wherein the processing system is further configured to terminate the service to said at least one of the one or more mobile clients if the product of the utility function and the availability function falls below a threshold.

19. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 14 wherein the processing system is further configured to determine said at least one of the one or more mobile clients to terminate the service to based on priorities assigned to the one or more mobile clients.

20. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein the processing system is further configured to determine a price for each of the one or more mobile clients to use the ad-hoc service provider to access the network.

21. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 20 wherein the processing system is further configured to determine the price for each of the one or more mobile clients based on the bandwidth available to allocate to each.

22. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 20 wherein the processing system is further configured to determine the price for each of the one or more mobile clients based on a price offered by each of at least one other ad-hoc service provider.

23. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 1 wherein said at least one parameter comprises one or more local parameters.

24. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 23 wherein said at least one parameter comprises one or more observable parameters from other ad-hoc service providers.

25. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 24 wherein the one or more observable parameters represent an average of local parameters associated with the other ad-hoc service providers.

26. The ad-hoc service provider of method of claim 24 wherein the one or more observable parameters comprises at least one of pricing, a quality of service or goodness metric, available bandwidth, and duration of service available for each of the other ad-hoc service providers.

27. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 23 wherein said one or more local parameters comprises revenue generated by the ad-hoc service provider for the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients, energy required by the ad-hoc service provider to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients, loss of bandwidth that would otherwise be available to the user to access the network, processing resources required by the processing system to provide the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients, a quality of service or goodness metric, network cost to support the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients, and server cost to support the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients.

28. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 27 wherein said one or more local parameters comprises network cost to support the allocated bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients.

29. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 28 wherein the network cost is related to a cost to a network operator that is dependent on the change in a mean state of utilization of the network for the network operator for an incremental wireless data service.

30. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 29 wherein the network cost is further related to a cost to the network operator that is dependent on a current system load in the network associated with the network operator.

31. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 30 wherein the processing system determines the network cost to compensate the network operator based on dynamic information about the system load from the network operator, static or dynamic information associated with a mean pricing for the network operator, and a minimum pricing for the network operator.

32. A mobile client, comprising:

a processing system configured to use an ad-hoc service provider to support a wireless connection to a network, the processing system being further configured to select the ad-hoc service provider based on at least one parameter related to the ad-hoc service provider'"'"'s ability to support the wireless connection.

33. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein said at least one parameter comprises duration of the wireless connection to the network that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client.

34. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein said at least one parameter comprises bandwidth that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client for the wireless connection to the network.

35. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein said at least one parameter comprises cost for using the ad-hoc service provider to provide the wireless connection to the network.

36. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein said at least one parameter comprises a quality of service metric for the ad-hoc service provider.

37. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein the processing system is further configured to select the ad-hoc service provider based on the quality of the wireless link to the ad-hoc service provider.

38. The mobile client of claim 32 wherein the processing system is further configured to select a plurality of ad-hoc service providers based on signal strength received from each, the processing system being further configured to select the ad-hoc service provider from the plurality of ad-hoc service providers.

39. The mobile client of claim 38 wherein the processing system is further configured to select, from the plurality of service providers, one or more ad-hoc service providers that are able to provide the mobile client with a wireless connection to the network for a desired duration, the processing system being further configured to select the ad-hoc service provider from the one or more ad-hoc service providers.

40. An ad-hoc service provider, comprising:

means for supporting a wireless connection to a network;

means for providing access to the network for one or more mobile clients;

means for allocating bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients for accessing the network based on at least one parameter related to the effect on the ad-hoc service provider for providing such access; and

means for providing a user with access to the network through the ad-hoc service provider.

41. The ad-hoc service provider of claim 40 wherein the means for allocating bandwidth comprises means for determining the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients by maximizing a utility function that is a function of said at least one parameter, the utility function being maximized when the derivative of the utility function is zero.

42. A mobile client, comprising:

means for using an ad-hoc service provider to support a wireless connection to a network; and

means for selecting the ad-hoc service provider based on at least one parameter related to the ad-hoc service provider'"'"'s ability to support the wireless connection.

43. The mobile client of claim 42 wherein said at least one parameter comprises at least one of (a) duration of the wireless connection to the network that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client, (b) bandwidth that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client for the wireless connection to the network, (c) cost for using the ad-hoc service provider to provide the wireless connection to the network, and (d) a quality of service metric for the ad-hoc service provider.

44. A method of communications, comprising:

supporting a wireless connection from an ad-hoc service provider to a network;

providing access to the network for one or more mobile clients;

allocating bandwidth to the one or more mobile clients for accessing the network based on at least one parameter related to the effect on the ad-hoc service provider for providing such bandwidth; and

providing a user with access to the network through the ad-hoc service provider.

45. The method of claim 44 wherein the allocation of bandwidth comprises determining the bandwidth allocated to the one or more mobile clients by maximizing a utility function that is a function of said at least one parameter, the utility function being maximized when the derivative of the utility function is zero.

46. A method of communications, comprising:

using an ad-hoc service provider to support a wireless connection from a mobile client to a network; and

selecting the ad-hoc service provider based on at least one parameter related to the ad-hoc service provider'"'"'s ability to support the wireless connection.

47. The method of claim 46 wherein said at least one parameter comprises at least one of (a) duration of the wireless connection to the network that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client, (b) bandwidth that the ad-hoc service provider is able to provide to the mobile client for the wireless connection to the network, (c) cost for using the ad-hoc service provider to provide the wireless connection to the network, and (d) a quality of service metric for the ad-hoc service provider.