Improvements in and relating to data traffic management in a telecommunication network

• Main Authors: Mehrdad Shariat, Maziar Nekovee
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 09.05.2018
• Subjects: ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE; ELECTRICITY; TRANSMISSION OF DIGITAL INFORMATION, e.g. TELEGRAPHICCOMMUNICATION; WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS NETWORKS

Disclosed is a method of steering data traffic between a Core Network, CN, and a User Equipment, UE, in a cluster of a telecommunication network. The cluster comprises a plurality of Access Points, AP, and at least two of the plurality of Access Points are connected via separate Points of Access, PoA, to the Core Network. The method comprises the steps of: in the event of an outage or Radio Link Failure RLF between a first Access Point and the User Equipment, either: steering data traffic from the first Access Point to a second Access Point and on to the User Equipment; or steering data traffic from a Cluster Head, CH, to a second Access Point and on to the User Equipment. The APs may utilise mm-wave technology which are more outage-prone and rely upon line of sight or strong reflections between the AP and UE to maintain a connection. The choice of at which point to steer the data from may be based on the state of the cluster based on one or more of inter-AP interface quality, loading, state of interface towards CN and/or the service-level requirements of various elements within the network.