An end-to-end network slicing framework for 5G wireless communication systems

Wireless industry nowadays is facing two major challenges: 1) how to support the vertical industry applications so that to expand the wireless industry market and 2) how to further enhance device capability and user experience. In this paper, we propose a technology framework to address these challenges. The proposed technology framework is based on end-to-end vertical and horizontal slicing, where vertical slicing enables vertical industry and services and horizontal slicing improves system capacity and user experience. The technology development on vertical slicing has already started in late 4G and early 5G and is mostly focused on slicing the core network. We envision this trend to continue with the development of vertical slicing in the radio access network and the air interface. Moving beyond vertical slicing, we propose to horizontally slice the computation and communication resources to form virtual computation platforms for solving the network capacity scaling problem and enhancing device capability and user experience. In this paper, we explain the concept of vertical and horizontal slicing and illustrate the slicing techniques in the air interface, the radio access network, the core network and the computation platform. This paper aims to initiate the discussion on the long-range technology roadmap and spur development on the solutions for E2E network slicing in 5G and beyond.