Page 314 - ITU-T Focus Group IMT-2020 Deliverables

5 ITU-T Focus Group IMT-2020 Deliverables

different users and applications based on time, location, network status and other dimensions. Moreover,
the open interface can be designed for third parties to achieve lower business access threshold, rapid on-line
and off-line business, unified management and reduced maintenance costs.
At the same time, with the popularization of mobile Internet and home broadband, access modes for fixed
broadband and mobile access and the needs of value-added services are constantly converging. Service chain
architecture facilitates the implementation of unified traffic management strategy of fixed and mobile
convergence, improves resource utilization, and further reduces deployment costs and expenses.

6.4 User Data Convergence

In 4G networks, user data is stored and managed by HSS. And in fixed networks, the user data equipment is
AAA Server. Data separation results in key drawbacks, such as data redundancy and service development
difficulties. In user data management respect of 5G networks, it is important to focus on user data
convergence.
User data convergence means not only to merge user data in HSS and AAA together that belong to the same
user, but also to provide unified user data management. Besides, It is expected to store the status data of a
large number of users, e.g., registered, unregistered. With the help of NFV, a large scale data-base could
provide this service of bulk storage. Due to data convergence of one user and convergence of lots of users’
data, it brings advantages of less maintenance and facilities e.g. service development and big data analysis.
From the view of service layer and control plane, user data convergence shall provide multiple kinds of access
protocols. And at the same time, to improve the efficiency of a large scale data-base, it is important to define
unified access protocols as few as possible.

6.5 Network Function Virtualization and Software Define Network
Network Function Virtualization (NFV) and Software Defined Network (SDN) are the foundation of future
network.

Network function virtualization transforms our network from dedicated hardware to common hardware.
Network function can be implemented by software. Management and orchestration are introduced to realize
unified resource management and allocation, to support auto-scaling, flexible function deployment and quick
business on-line.

SDN realizes the separation of control plane and user plane, supports unified management of network
connection, and realizes intelligent and optimized traffic scheduling.

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