MEVICO Project Description.

The existing mobile network architectures need to evolve to cope with future demand of high bandwidth, a large and evolving set of services with new specific requirements, security, low energy consumption and optimal spectrum utilization.
MEVICO will define an architecture for deploying the next generation mobile networks in line with user demands' evolution. The project starts identifying the requirements for the new architecture and highlight the ones with higher priority for implementation. Then, the limitations of existing mobile networks architectures to answer these requirements will be identified. MEVICO will design the End-to-End architecture from User Equipments (UE) to air interface, backhaul and core network. The architecture will be based on novel concepts allowing overcoming the identified limitations.

The research project proposal in Celtic Call7 is on research of the network aspects of the 3GPP LTE-mobile broadband netw ork for its evolution in the mid-term in 2011-2014.

The goal is to contribute to the technical drive and leadership of the EPC network (3GPP), and thus support the European industry to maintain and extend its strong technical and market position in the mobile networks market. The results can be used as contributions for further development of the 3GPP standard on EPC in Rel11-Rel13. The scope of the project is mobile network evolution in the mid-term, whereas EU FP7 projects cover the Future Internet i n the longer term. The project is to follow an end-to-end system approach on evolution of the Evolved Packet Core network of the 3GPP.

The focus will on the connectivity layers of the system, for example on the part of the future LTE network which provides the efficient packet transport and mobility support for the applications & end-user services accessed over the LTE and L TE-Advanced radio systems.

The target is to innovate and develop new network concepts for meeting the future requirements of a) the evolving LTE and LTE-A radio technologies and b) evolving usage and services of the Internet. The radio system evolution is already takin g place with LTE-A both in research and in the standardization (3GPP, ITU-R), and hence call for related research on the network aspects. As for the latter driver, a strong increase in the number of mobile users and capacity needs in the netw ork is foreseen. They require further optimization of the network for capacity and cost, as well as ways to provide end-user services with more individual experience.

The technical research areas of the project will cover relevant topics in the areas of
network architecture,
mobility & routing,
packet transport,
traffic management,
network management &
engineering and techno-economic aspects.

The project will include both conceptual research and demo/trial system implementations.