Ethernet services over mobile WiMAX

Ethernet services represent a steadily growing portion of the fixed telecommunication market. To enable the provisioning of Ethernet services over IEEE 802.16e, the mobile WiMAX network architecture supports transparent Ethernet transport as an optional extension to the IP services architecture. Ethernet support is tightly aligned to the IP services network model, and leverages many data path and control plane functions from its IP sibling to keep the implementation and operation overhead low for the Ethernet extension. Mobile WiMAX provides IP services as well as Ethernet services over the same mobile access network. The intrinsic mobility support may create new deployment opportunities for Ethernet services. Initially, the Ethernet extension may be mostly used to realize wireless access for DSL networks based on the same network interfaces defined for the wired Ethernet-based DSL aggregation.