Towards Organic 6G Networks: Virtualization and Live Migration of Core Network Functions

TL;DR

This paper explores container virtualization and live migration techniques for 5G core network functions to enhance flexibility and meet the demanding requirements of Industry 4.0 use cases in future 6G networks.

Contribution

It provides an analysis of container-based virtualization for 5G core functions and evaluates live migration strategies based on key performance metrics.

Findings

Container virtualization offers benefits over hardware VMs for 5G core functions.

Live migration of 5GC functions can be optimized for minimal downtime.

Different functions require tailored migration approaches based on their state and plane location.

Abstract

In the context of Industry 4.0, more and more mobile use cases are appearing on industrial factory floors. These use cases place high demands on various quantitative requirements, such as latency, availability, and more. In addition, qualitative requirements such as flexibility are arising. Since virtualization technology is a key enabler for the flexibility that is required by novel use cases and on the way to organic networking as it is addressed by 6G, we investigate container virtualization technology in this paper. We focus on container technology since OS-level virtualization has multiple benefits compared to hardware virtualization, such as VMs. Thus, we discuss several aspects of container based virtualization, e.g. selection of suitable network drivers and orchestration tools, with respect to most important 5GC functions. In addition, the functions have different quantitative or qualitative requirements depending on whether they are stateless or stateful, and whether the specific function is located at either the control or user plane. Therefore, we also analyze the aforementioned live migration concepts for the 5GC functions and evaluate them based on well-defined metrics, such as migration time and process downtime.