An SDN-NFV Orchestration for Reliable and Low Latency Mobility in Off-the-Shelf WiFi

Abstract

Due to its ubiquitous use, WiFi may play an essential role in providing indoor connectivity for the new real-time services in several 5G verticals. However, there are still pressing issues to be addressed, requiring new mobility management schemes to guarantee reliable and low latency communications. In this paper, we propose a novel SDN-NFV based architecture with a low cost off-the-shelf WiFi that explores a multiconnectivity scheme at the user devices. In order to demonstrate the feasibility of our approach, we developed a prototype and performed experiments on seamless handover using: i) an SDNNFV based packet duplication solution; and ii) a source-routing solution for end-to-end communication. Results show that the proposed architecture can provide an efficient seamless handover, increasing the likelihood of delivering packets with minimal effects on latency.