Experiments on Handover Using Combination of Bicast and Forwarding of IP Packet for Future IP-based RANs

This paper proposes a handover method that uses a combination of bicast and forwarding (BIFO) of IP packets to achieve a short handover delay time and a low amount of IP packet traffic in the backhaul for future IP-based radio access networks (RANs). To validate the effect of the proposed BIFO method, we implemented prototype experimental equipment comprising a RAN_access router (RAN_AR), base stations (BSs) associated with a radio control server (RCS), and user equipment (UE) including a controller. The experimental results show that the BIFO achieves a shorter handover delay time than when using only the conventional bicast method or forwarding method by taking advantage of the respective merits of bicast and forwarding. The results also confirm that the BIFO method achieves the handover delay time in the control plane of approximately 10 - 20 msec.