Stefan Rommer

Policy and charging control in the evolved packet system

Policy and charging control provides operators with advanced tools for service-aware QoS and charging control. PCC for the evolved packet system, defined as part of the 3 GPP Release 8 specifications, has evolved significantly from previous releases to support multiple-access technologies, roaming, and mobility. Within the PCC framework, a number of protocols have been specified to implement these functions. This article describes key PCC concepts and explains additional amendments to support PCC in the EPS.

Advanced WLAN integration with the 3GPP evolved packet core

The large growth in mobile broadband traffic, wide support of Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) technology in mobile devices, and the desire of operators to provide services anywhere at any time, have led to a need to integrate WLANs with the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Evolved Packet Core (EPC). This paper starts with a description of an architecture that 3GPP has defined to achieve this. It describes how a mobile device can set up an IP connection over WLAN routed via EPC without imposing new requirements on the mobile device. It also describes how more advanced features that do impose new requirements on the mobile device can be supported in an incremental fashion.

Unified control plane: converged policy and charging control

This article describes a standardized architectural framework that enables network resources and policy control, and charging enforcement for both mobile and fixed networks. These capabilities together facilitate the realization of a unified control plane. The most relevant use cases supported by such a unified control plane are presented and described.