SDN wireless backhauling for Small Cells

Small Cells are recognized as one of the key enablers to address the forecasted exponential traffic increase in future mobile networks. However, several major technical hurdles need to be overcome to fulfill the promise of Small Cells. In this paper we introduce a novel architecture that enables the application of Software Defined Networking (SDN) techniques on the wireless Small Cell backhaul. We demonstrate our architecture in a testbed prototype, where we analyze the costs incurred in the additional processing and the centralization of state imposed by SDN, while motivating the benefits of our architecture in terms of improved network management and control.