Tool Use as Action: Towards Agentic Control in Mobile Core Networks

TL;DR

This paper proposes an agentic AI framework for 6G mobile core networks, featuring a tool-based interface and protocols to enable autonomous, intent-driven network operations.

Contribution

It introduces a novel tool-based interface design and experimental prototype utilizing agentic AI for mobile core networks, with protocols for agent-tool and agent-agent communication.

Findings

Analyzed packet-level message flows and latency in the AI-enabled network setup.

Demonstrated the feasibility of executing intent-based tasks with AI agents and tools.

Showcased how agentic AI can enhance autonomy in next-generation mobile networks.

Abstract

Artificial Intelligence (AI) will play an essential role in 6G. It will fundamentally reshape the network architecture itself and drive major changes in the design of network entities, interfaces, and procedures. The adoption of agentic AI in next-generation networks is expected to enhance network intelligence and autonomy through agents capable of planning, reasoning, and acting, while also opening up new business opportunities. Under this vision, existing network functions are expected to evolve into AI-enabled agents and tools that deliver both connectivity and beyond-connectivity services. As an initial attempt to move toward this vision, this paper presents a tool-based interface design and an experimental prototype that are based on agentic AI for the mobile core network, with the Model Context Protocol (MCP) and the Agent2Agent (A2A) protocol as foundational protocols. MCP is selected to design the interface between the agent and network tools, and the A2A protocol is used for message exchange between AI agents. In such an experimental setup, we analyze packet-level message flows between the agents, tools, and network functions and break down the latency of end-to-end operations, starting from the prompt injection until the completion of the input task. This work demonstrates how an AI agent-based core network combined with network-specific tools can be utilized in next generation mobile systems to execute intent-based tasks.