Handover Coordinator for Improved Handover Performance in PMIPv6-Supported Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

In next generation mobile networks where heterogeneous but complementary wireless networks will coexist and combine resources to provide ubiquitous access to internet services, vertical handover needs to be executed seamlessly to ensure that active service sessions are not disrupted during mobility events. Seamless handover, which should be non-perceptible to the mobile user, can be experienced if the handover latency and packet losses during the handover period are negligible. Various mobility management protocols have been proposed and standardized to support mobility across heterogeneous networks but they do not provide seamless handover in their current form. In this paper, we propose to utilize and optimize Proxy Mobile IPv6 with a Handover Coordinator, which is a network-based entity, to further improve handover performance in terms of packet loss, handover delay and signaling overhead in a micromobility domain. Thus, we introduce a new approach of performing seamless and soft handover among heterogeneous wireless networks. An in depth analysis of the proposed architectural handover mechanism is presented and the conclusion from analytical and simulation results shows that handover delay and packet loss are reduced without incurring signaling overhead in the air interface.