The Case for Formation of ISP-Content Providers Consortiums by Nash Bargaining for Internet Content Delivery

TL;DR

This paper models the formation of ISP-Content Provider consortiums for content caching using Nash bargaining, analyzing conditions for coalition stability and profit sharing under various regulatory scenarios.

Contribution

It introduces a game-theoretic framework for coalition formation between ISPs and Content Providers, incorporating cost sharing, capacity expansion, and Net Neutrality constraints.

Findings

Grand Coalition formation conditions are derived.

Caching is viable under Net Neutrality regulations.

Profit sharing bounds are established for coalition members.

Abstract

The formation of consortiums of a broadband access Internet Service Provider (ISP) and multiple Content Providers (CP) is considered for large-scale content caching. The consortium members share costs from operations and investments in the supporting infrastructure. Correspondingly, the model's cost function includes marginal and fixed costs; the latter has been important in determining industry structure. Also, if Net Neutrality regulations permit, additional network capacity on the ISP's last mile may be contracted by the CPs. The number of subscribers is determined by a combination of users' price elasticity of demand and Quality of Experience. The profit generated by a coalition after pricing and design optimization determines the game's characteristic function. Coalition formation is by a bargaining procedure due to Okada (1996) based on random proposers in a non-cooperative, multi-player game-theoretic framework. A necessary and sufficient condition is obtained for the Grand Coalition to form, which bounds subsidies from large to small contributors. Caching is generally supported even under Net Neutrality regulations. The Grand Coalition's profit matches upper bounds. Numerical results illustrate the analytic results.