WRR based Two-Level Slice Scheduler for 5G RAN Sharing in the context of Neutral Host

Abstract

We investigate the sub-channel sharing problem in the context of Neutral Host Radio Access Network (RAN) slicing. We consider a single user Multiple Input Multiple Output system where each Virtual Network Operator (VNO) brings their own sub-channels and they use the RAN infrastructure in a common way. We assume that the power budget is constant per Physical Resource Block (PRB). We consider only the Downlink and a system made of one single cell. We assume the RAN infrastructure is operated by the Neutral Host. First, we consider the State of the Art (SOA), static sub-channel allocation where the VNOs are allocated only the sub-channels they brought. In the case of SOA, if a VNO experiences no traffic then the sub-channels will remain idle and the resources would be wasted. Considering this we propose a two-level-slice scheduler to utilize the idle resources better than the SOA. We implement the proposed scheduler in an open-source RAN platform, Open-Air-Interface (OAI). We provide detailed set-up guides for the OAI platform in emulation and with Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) hardware. Finally, we compare the performance of the SOA and the proposed scheduler in terms of system throughput and delay in four different scenarios. The proposed two-level-slice scheduler provides strictly less delay than the SOA in all the experiments.