VIRTUAL MACHINE MOBILITY WITH EVOLVED PACKET CORE

摘要

A system and method for controlling mobility of a subscriber-specific Virtual Machine (VM) instance from one VM to another VM using a network node (such as an Evolved Packet Gateway (EPG)) in an Evolved Packet Core (EPC) in a mobile communication network. The EPG may control the VM mobility for each subscriber in the context of cloud-based services or virtualized applications. The EPG may use GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP) tunnels rooted at the EPG to Data Center (DC) VMs to govern intra-DC and inter-DC mobility of VMs and also to tie in the mobility triggers to service provider's policies. Each VM session for the mobile subscribers is anchored in the EPG, which then assumes the control of VM mobility for each subscriber through the new GTP interface with the VMs. The EPC-based control of VM mobility can provide optimization of cloud services accessed by a subscriber over a mobile connection.

主权项

1. A method for managing mobility of a subscriber-specific Virtual Machine (VM) instance from a first VM to a second VM for a mobile subscriber in a mobile communication network, wherein the VM instance is initially created in the first VM that is implemented at a first Data Center (DC) associated with the mobile communication network, and wherein the method comprises performing the following using a network node in a packet-switched Core Network (CN) in the mobile communication network:
anchoring a VM session associated with the VM instance; and controlling the mobility of the subscriber-specific VM instance from the first VM to the second VM, wherein the second VM is implemented at one of the following:
the first DC, anda second DC that is different from the first DC.