Managing radio-based private networks

Abstract

Various embodiments for managing a radio-based private network are disclosed. In one embodiment, a cellular network includes at least one cell that provides radio-based private network coverage for sites of an organization. The system also includes at least one computing device in the cloud provider network that implements one or more network functions for an associated core network of the radio-based private network.

Description

[0001] This application is a divisional application of the invention patent application with Chinese application number 2021800921705 (corresponding to PCT international application number PCT / US2021 / 062795), application date December 10, 2021, and invention name “Managing Radio-based Private Networks”.

[0002] CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

[0003] This application claims the benefit of and priority to U.S. patent application Ser. No. 17 / 118,563, filed on Dec. 10, 2020, entitled “MANAGINGRADIO-BASED PRIVATE NETWORKS,” the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. Background Art

[0004] 5G is the fifth generation technology standard for broadband cellular networks, and is planned to eventually replace the fourth generation (4G) standard of Long Term Evolution (LTE). 5G technology will greatly increase bandwidth, thereby expanding the cellular market beyond smartphones to provide last-mile connectivity for desktops, set-top boxes, laptops, Internet of Things (IoT) devices, etc. Some 5G cells may use spectrum similar to 4G, while other 5G cells may use spectrum in the millimeter wave band. Millimeter wave band cells cover a relatively small area, but have much higher throughput than 4G. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0005] Many aspects of the present disclosure may be better understood with reference to the following drawings. The components in the drawings are not necessarily drawn to scale, with emphasis placed on clearly illustrating the principles of the present disclosure. In addition, the same reference numerals in the drawings designate corresponding parts throughout the multiple views.

[0006] Figure 1A is a diagram of an example of a communication network deployed and managed according to various embodiments of the present disclosure.

[0007] Figure 1B is an example of a radio-based private network used on an organizational campus with multiple buildings and deployed according to various embodiments of the present disclosure.

[0008] Figure 2A An example of a networking environment including a cloud provider network and further including various provider underlay extensions of the cloud provider network according to some embodiments of the present disclosure is shown, which networking environment can be used in various locations within the communication network of Figure 1.

[0009] Figure 2B An example of cellularization and geographical distribution of the communication network of FIG. 1 is depicted for providing a highly available user plane function (UPF).

[0010] Figure 3 According to some embodiments of the present disclosure Figure 2A An example of a networking environment that includes geographically dispersed provider infrastructure extensions.

[0011] Figure 4 According to various embodiments of the present disclosure Figure 2A A schematic block diagram of a networking environment.

[0012] Figures 5 to 7 It is a diagram showing various embodiments according to the present disclosure as Figure 4 A flow diagram of an example of functions implemented by executing a portion of a radio-based dedicated network management service in a computing environment within a networking environment.

[0013] Figure 8 It is a diagram showing various embodiments according to the present disclosure as Figure 4 A flow diagram of one example of functionality implemented to execute a portion of a capacity management service in a computing environment within a networked environment.

[0014] Fig. 9 According to various embodiments of the present disclosure, Figure 4 A schematic block diagram of an example illustration of a computing environment employed in a networking environment. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0015] The present disclosure relates to the automatic deployment, modification and management of radio-based private networks (such as 4G and 5G radio access networks) or parts of such radio-based networks and associated core networks using cloud provider network infrastructure. Previous radio-based network deployments relied on manual deployment and configuration at each step of the process. This has proven to be extremely time-consuming and expensive. In addition, in previous generations, software was inherently related to vendor-specific hardware, preventing customers from deploying alternative software. In contrast, for 5G, the hardware is decoupled from the software stack, which allows greater flexibility and allows components of radio-based networks to be executed on cloud provider infrastructure. Using a cloud distribution model for radio-based networks (such as 5G networks) can facilitate the processing of network traffic from hundreds to billions of connected devices and computationally intensive applications, while delivering faster, lower latency and greater capacity than other types of networks.

[0016] Historically, enterprises have had to choose between performance and price when evaluating their enterprise connectivity solutions. Cellular networks can provide high performance, good indoor and outdoor coverage, and advanced quality of service (QoS) connectivity features, but dedicated cellular networks can be expensive and complex to manage. While Ethernet and Wi-Fi require less upfront investment and are easier to manage, enterprises often find that they are less reliable, require a lot of work to get the best coverage, and do not provide QoS features such as guaranteed bit rate, latency, and reliability.

[0017] The disclosed radio-based private network service can provide enterprises with the best of both worlds - the performance, coverage and QoS of carrier-grade cellular networks, and the simplicity and cost of deployment and operation associated with Wi-Fi. The disclosed service can provide suitable hardware in different form factors, which enterprises can deploy to their sites and integrate with software that runs the entire network (from small cell sites to Internet breakout points). Enterprises can freely deploy various 5G devices and sensors throughout the enterprise (factory floors, warehouses, halls, and communication centers) and manage these devices, register users and assign QoS through a management console. With the disclosed technology, customers can allocate constant bit rate throughput to all their devices (such as cameras, sensors or IoT devices), provide reliable low-latency connections for devices running on the factory floor, and allocate broadband connections to all handheld devices. The disclosed service can manage all the software required to provide connections that meet specified constraints and requirements. This enables a whole new set of applications with strict QoS or high IoT device density requirements that traditionally cannot run on Wi-Fi networks.

[0018] The disclosed service supports multiple deployment scenarios. In a cloud-only deployment, the service can provide a small radio cell that an enterprise customer can place on site, while the network functions and other network software run in the nearest cloud provider availability zone or edge location (or one of several nearest cloud provider availability zones or edge locations). For enterprises that want to deploy on-premises, the disclosed service provides cloud provider hardware, such as the underlying extensions described in this article. In this mode, the network and applications remain within the enterprise, enabling the enterprise to securely store and process data that needs to remain locally (for example, for regulatory compliance, security considerations, etc.). In addition, the disclosed service can allow any computing and storage that is not used to run a radio-based network to be used to run any local workload via the same API that customers can use to run workloads in traditional cloud provider areas. Advantageously, because of this, enterprises do not have to worry about oversizing and wasting capacity, because the service will enable any excess capacity to be used for local processing and will provision new hardware and software as network needs change. In addition, the disclosed service can provide application development APIs that expose and manage 5G capabilities such as QoS, enabling customers to build applications that can fully utilize the latency and bandwidth capabilities of their network without having to understand the details of the network.

[0019] In addition, the disclosed service can provide a dedicated zone to run local applications within the cloud provider network. The dedicated zone can be connected to a wider regional zone and become an effective part of it, and allow customers to manage the dedicated zone using the same API and tools used in the cloud provider network. Like the availability zone, a virtual private network subnet can be assigned to the dedicated zone. The API can be used to create subnets and assign them to all zones that the customer wants to use, including dedicated zones and other existing zones. The management console can provide a simplified process for creating a dedicated zone. Virtual machine instances and containers can be launched in a dedicated zone, just like in a regional zone. Customers can configure network gateways to define routes, assign IP addresses, set up network address translation (NAT), etc. Automatic scaling can be used to scale the capacity of virtual machine instances or containers according to needs in the dedicated zone. The same management and authentication API of the cloud provider network can be used in the dedicated zone. In some cases, since cloud services available in regional zones can be accessed remotely from the dedicated zone through a secure connection, these cloud services can be accessed without upgrading or modifying local deployments.

[0020] Various embodiments of the present disclosure introduce methods that allow customers to order and deploy radio-based private networks and associated core networks in an automated manner. Customers may include enterprises and organizations that wish to establish radio-based networks for internal use (e.g., private 5G networks). Through various user interfaces, customers can specify their network plans or requirements (e.g., physical site layouts and device / application types and quantities), and can automatically determine and pre-configure various components required to implement radio-based private networks for customers. Hardware such as antennas, radios, and computer servers can be pre-configured for the customer's radio-based private network and shipped to the customer. The process of installing pre-configured hardware is largely plug-and-play, and the radio-based private network can be activated through a user interface or API. In addition to deploying a radio-based private network (such as all or part of a new radio access network), various embodiments of the present disclosure can facilitate the modification and management of radio-based private networks, including the deployment of pre-configured equipment for additional cells and the allocation of QoS constraints for specific devices or applications on its radio-based private network.

[0021] Various embodiments of the present disclosure may also introduce the concepts of elasticity and utility computing from a cloud computing model to a radio-based private network and an associated core network. For example, the disclosed technology may run core and radio access network functions and associated control plane management functions on a cloud provider infrastructure, thereby creating a cloud-native core network and / or a cloud-native radio access network (RAN). In some embodiments, such core and RAN network functions may be based on the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) specification. By providing a cloud-native radio-based network, customers can dynamically scale their radio-based private network based on utilization, latency requirements, and / or other factors. In some cases, the hardware sent to the customer includes sufficient capacity to run programs for operating and managing the radio-based network and other workloads of the customer (e.g., their applications), so that any capacity not used for the radio-based network can be accessed to run workloads under the utility computing model. Advantageously, the customer's radio-based network can be expanded to this excess capacity as needed, for example, even before new physical hardware is provisioned for the customer, allowing the hardware usage requirements of the radio-based network to be increased. Customers can also configure thresholds to receive alerts related to radio-based network usage and excess capacity usage of their provisioned infrastructure to more effectively manage the provisioning of new infrastructure or de-provisioning of existing infrastructure based on their dynamic network and workload requirements.

[0022] Those skilled in the art will appreciate from this disclosure that certain embodiments may be able to achieve certain advantages, including some or all of the following: (1) improving the user experience by allowing organizations to deploy their own radio-based private networks in a highly automated plug-and-play manner; (2) increasing the flexibility of computer systems by allowing computing hardware previously dedicated to network functions of radio-based networks and associated core networks to be reused for other applications; (3) increasing the flexibility of computer systems by allowing computing hardware previously dedicated to a first radio-based private network to be automatically reused for a second radio-based private network (or reused between RAN and core network functions of the same radio-based network as needed); (4) improving user deployment of radio-based private networks by pre-configuring antennas, radios, and other hardware. experience, thereby providing a plug-and-play installation experience; (5) improving the performance of radio-based private networks by optimizing cell deployment and spectrum utilization; (6) improving the performance and management of radio-based networks by monitoring performance metrics and adding, removing, and reconfiguring cells as needed to maintain acceptable performance; (7) improving the scalability and overall performance of radio-based private networks by shifting network functions previously provided by proprietary hardware to virtual machine instances operated by elastic cloud computing providers under a utility computing model; (8) reducing latency in radio-based private networks by shifting network functions to virtual machine instances executed on the cloud service provider's computing devices at the cell site; (9) improving the security of radio-based private networks by configuring network function workloads to remain at the customer's premises; and so on.

[0023] One of the benefits of the present disclosure is the ability to deploy and link network functions together to deliver end-to-end services that meet specified constraints and requirements. According to the present disclosure, network functions organized into microservices work together to provide end-to-end connectivity. One set of network functions is part of the radio network, running in cellular towers and performing conversion of wireless signals to IP. Other network functions run in large data centers, execute business logic related to subscribers and route IP traffic to the Internet and back. For applications that use new 5G features (such as low-latency communications and reserved bandwidth), these two types of network functions need to work together to properly schedule and reserve wireless spectrum, and perform real-time computing and data processing. The currently disclosed technology provides edge positioning hardware (as further described below), which is integrated with network functions that run across the entire network from cell sites to Internet breakout points, and orchestrates network functions to meet the required quality of service (QoS) constraints. This enables a new set of applications with strict QoS requirements, from factory-based Internet of Things (IoT) to augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), game streaming, and autonomous navigation support for connected vehicles, which were previously impossible to run on mobile networks.

[0024] The described "Elastic 5G" service provides and manages all the hardware, software, and network functions required to build a network. In some embodiments, the network functions may be developed and managed by a cloud service provider; however, the described control plane may manage network functions from a range of providers, allowing customers to use a single set of APIs to call and manage their choice of network functions on the cloud infrastructure. The Elastic 5G service beneficially automates the creation of an end-to-end 5G network from hardware to network functions, thereby reducing the time to deploy the network and the operational costs of operating the network. By providing an API that exposes network capabilities, the exposed Elastic 5G service enables applications to simply specify the desired QoS as constraints, and then deploy and link network functions together to deliver an end-to-end service that meets the specified requirements, making it possible to easily build new applications.

[0025] The present disclosure describes embodiments related to the creation and management of a cloud native 5G core and / or a cloud native 5G RAN and associated control plane components. Cloud native refers to an approach to building and running applications that leverages the advantages of a cloud computing distribution model, such as dynamic scalability, distributed computing, and high availability (including geographic distribution, redundancy, and failover). Cloud native refers to how these applications are created and deployed to be suitable for deployment in a public cloud. While cloud native applications can (and often do) run in a public cloud, they can also run in a local data center. Some cloud native applications can be containerized, for example packaging different parts, functions, or sub-units of an application in their own containers, which can be dynamically orchestrated so that each part can be actively scheduled and managed to optimize resource utilization. These containerized applications can be built using a microservices architecture to improve the overall agility and maintainability of the application.

[0026] In a microservices architecture, an application is arranged as a series of smaller sub-units ("microservices") that can be deployed and scaled independently of each other and can communicate with each other over a network. These microservices are typically fine-grained in that they have specific technical and functional granularity and typically implement lightweight communication protocols. The microservices of an application can perform different functions from each other, can be deployed independently, and can use different programming languages, databases, and hardware / software environments from each other. Decomposing an application into smaller services helps improve the modularity of the application, enables on-demand replacement of individual microservices, and parallelizes development by enabling teams to develop, deploy, and maintain their microservices independently of each other. In some examples, microservices can be deployed using virtual machines, containers, or serverless functions. The disclosed core and RAN software can follow a microservices architecture so that the described radio-based network consists of independent sub-units that can be deployed and scaled on demand.

[0027] Now turn to Figure 1A , which shows an example of a communication network 100 deployed and managed according to various embodiments of the present disclosure. The communication network 100 includes a radio-based private network 103, which can correspond to a cellular network such as a fourth generation (4G) long term evolution (LTE) network, a fifth generation (5G) network, a 4G-5G hybrid core with 4G and 5G RAN, or another network providing wireless network access. The radio-based private network 103 can be operated by a cloud service provider for an enterprise, non-profit organization, school system, government entity, or other organization. Although referred to as a private network, the radio-based private network 103 can use a private network address or a public network address in various embodiments.

[0028] Various deployments of the radio-based private network 103 may include one or more of a core network and a RAN network, and a control plane for running the core and / or RAN network on a cloud provider infrastructure. As described above, these components can be developed in a cloud-native manner, such as using a microservices architecture, so that traffic and transactions are efficiently scaled using centralized control and distributed processing. These components can be based on 3GPP specifications and follow an application architecture (CUPS architecture) that separates control plane and user plane processing.

[0029] The radio-based private network 103 provides wireless network access to a plurality of wireless devices 106, which may be mobile devices or fixed-location devices. In various examples, the wireless devices 106 may include smartphones, connected vehicles, IoT devices, sensors, machines (e.g., in manufacturing facilities), hotspots, and other devices. Such wireless devices 106 are sometimes referred to as user equipment (UE) or customer premises equipment (CPE).

[0030] The radio-based private network 103 may include a radio access network (RAN) that provides wireless network access to multiple wireless devices 106 through multiple cells 109. Each cell 109 may be equipped with one or more antennas and one or more radio units that send wireless data signals to and receive wireless data signals from the wireless device 106. The antenna may be configured for one or more frequency bands, and the radio unit may also be frequency agile or frequency adjustable. The antenna may be associated with a specific gain or beam width so as to focus the signal in a specific direction or azimuth range, thereby potentially allowing the reuse of frequencies in different directions. In addition, the antenna may be horizontally polarized, vertically polarized, or circularly polarized. In some examples, the radio unit may utilize multiple input multiple output (MIMO) technology to send and receive signals. In this way, the RAN implements radio access technology to achieve a radio connection with the wireless device 106 and provides a connection to the core network of the radio-based private network. The components of the RAN include base stations and antennas covering a given physical area, as well as core network items required for managing connections with the RAN.

[0031] Data traffic is typically routed to the core network through a fiber transport network consisting of multiple hops of layer 3 routers (e.g., at aggregation sites). The core network is typically housed in one or more data centers. The core network typically aggregates data traffic from terminal devices, authenticates subscribers and devices, applies personalized policies, and manages the mobility of devices before routing traffic to operator services or the Internet. For example, the 5G core can be decomposed into multiple microservice elements, with the control plane and the user plane separated. The 5G core can contain virtualized, software-based network functions (e.g., deployed as microservices) rather than physical network elements, and can therefore be instantiated in a multi-access edge computing (MEC) cloud infrastructure. The network functions of the core network may include a user plane function (UPF), an access and mobility management function (AMF), and a session management function (SMF), which will be described in more detail below. For data traffic to locations outside the communication network 100, the network functions typically include a firewall through which traffic can enter or leave the communication network 100 to reach an external network, such as the Internet or a cloud provider network. Note that in some embodiments, the communications network 100 may include facilities that allow traffic to enter or leave from a site further downstream in the core network (eg, at an aggregation site or a radio-based private network 103).

[0032] UPF provides an interconnection point between the mobile infrastructure and the data network (DN), namely the encapsulation and decapsulation of the General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) tunneling protocol for the user plane (GTP-U). UPF can also provide a session anchor point for providing mobility within the RAN, including sending one or more end marker packets to the RAN base station. UPF can also handle packet routing and forwarding, including directing traffic to a specific data network based on traffic matching filters. Another feature of UPF includes per-flow or per-application QoS processing, including transport-level packet marking for uplink (UL) and downlink (DL), and rate limiting. UPF can be implemented as a cloud-native network function using a modern microservices approach, for example deployable within a serverless framework (abstracting the underlying infrastructure on which the code runs via managed services).

[0033] The AMF may receive connection and session information from the wireless device 106 or the RAN and may handle connection and mobility management tasks. For example, the AMF may manage handovers between base stations in the RAN. In some examples, the AMF may be considered an access point to the 5G core by terminating certain RAN control plane and wireless device 106 traffic. The AMF may also implement encryption and integrity protection algorithms.

[0034] SMF can handle session establishment or modification, such as by creating, updating, and deleting protocol data unit (PDU) sessions and managing session context within UPF. SMF can also implement Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) and IP Address Management (IPAM). SMF can be implemented as a cloud-native network function using a modern microservices approach.

[0035] Various network functions implementing the radio-based private network 103 may be deployed in a distributed computing device 112, which may correspond to a general-purpose computing device configured to perform network functions. For example, the distributed computing device 112 may execute one or more virtual machine instances, which in turn are configured to execute one or more services that perform network functions. In one embodiment, the distributed computing device 112 is a hardened machine deployed at each cell site.

[0036] In contrast, one or more centralized computing devices 115 can perform various network functions at a central site operated by a customer. For example, the centralized computing device 115 can be located at the center of the customer's premises in a conditional server room. The centralized computing device 115 can execute one or more virtual machine instances, which are in turn configured to execute one or more services that perform network functions.

[0037] In one or more embodiments, network traffic from the radio-based private network 103 is backhauled to one or more core computing devices 118, which may be located in one or more data centers remote from the customer site. The core computing devices 118 may also perform various network functions, including routing network traffic to and from a network 121, which may correspond to the Internet and / or other external public or private networks. The core computing devices 118 may perform functionality related to management of the communication network 100 (e.g., billing, mobility management, etc.) as well as transport functionality to relay traffic between the communication network 100 and other networks.

[0038] Move to Figure 1B , shows an example of a radio-based private network 150 used on an organizational campus having multiple buildings 153 (such as a business such as a company, a school, or other organizational premises) and deployed according to various embodiments of the present disclosure. Figure 1B An example with multiple buildings is depicted, but it should be understood that the disclosed technology can be similarly applied to any layout of a site, which may include one or more buildings and / or one or more outdoor spaces (such as a stadium or other outdoor venue).

[0039] The radio-based private network 150 in this non-limiting example includes four cells 156a, 156b, 156c and 156d to completely cover the organizational campus. The cells 156 can overlap slightly to provide detailed coverage within each building 153. Adjacent or overlapping cells 156 are configured to operate with non-interfering frequencies. For example, cell 156a can use frequency A, cell 156b can use frequency B, and cell 156c can use frequency C, which are all different frequencies when the coverage of the corresponding cells 156a, 156b and 156c overlaps. However, cell 156d can use, for example, frequency A or B because the coverage of cell 156d does not overlap with cells 156a or 156b.

[0040] Note that cells 156 may be added to or removed from the radio-based private network 150, depending on usage or other network metrics. In some cases, the signal strength to the cells 156 may be increased to reduce the number of cells 156, or the signal strength to the cells 156 may be reduced to increase the number of cells 156, while allowing spectrum reuse between the cells 156. In addition, computing capacity may be added within the geographic area of ​​the organization's campus or within the cloud provider network to reduce latency, maintain security, and increase reliability of the radio-based private network 150 as needed. In some cases, the computing capacity of the software implementing the radio-based private network 150 may be mostly or entirely provisioned in the cloud provider network rather than at the customer's premises (e.g., in a regional data center of a cloud service provider). The software may implement various network functions, such as UPF, AMF, SMF, etc., which may correspond to core network functions, central unit network functions, and distributed unit network functions. Some network functions, such as distributed unit network functions, may be retained at the cell site.

[0041] Figure 2A An example of a networked environment 200 including a cloud provider network 203 and further including various provider underlying extensions of the cloud provider network according to some embodiments is shown, which can be used in conjunction with a local customer deployment within the communication network 100 of Figure 1. The cloud provider network 203 (sometimes referred to simply as a "cloud") refers to a network-accessible pool of computing resources (such as computing, storage and networking resources, applications and services), which can be virtualized or bare metal. The cloud can provide convenient on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources that can be programmatically provisioned and released in response to customer commands. These resources can be dynamically provisioned and reconfigured to adjust to variable loads. Therefore, cloud computing can be viewed as applications delivered as services over a public accessible network (e.g., the Internet, a cellular communication network) and the hardware and software in the cloud provider data center that provides those services.

[0042] The cloud provider network 203 can provide users with an on-demand scalable computing platform through the network, for example, allowing users to have scalable "virtual computing devices" for their use through their use of computing servers (the computing servers provide computing instances through one or both of central processing units (CPUs) and graphics processing units (GPUs), optionally used together with local storage devices) and block storage servers (the block storage servers provide virtualized persistent block storage for specified computing instances). These virtual computing devices have the attributes of personal computing devices, including hardware (various types of processors, local memory, random access memory (RAM), hard disk and / or solid state drive ("SSD") storage devices), operating system options, networking capabilities, and pre-loaded application software. Each virtual computing device can also virtualize its console input and output (e.g., keyboard, display, and mouse). This virtualization allows users to connect to their virtual computing devices using computer applications such as browsers, APIs, software development kits (SDKs), etc., so as to configure and use their virtual computing devices like personal computing devices. Unlike personal computing devices that have a fixed amount of hardware resources available to users, the hardware associated with virtual computing devices can be scaled up or down depending on the resources required by the user.

[0043] As indicated above, users can use various interfaces 206 (e.g., APIs) via the intermediate network 212 to connect to virtualized computing devices and other cloud provider network 203 resources and services, and configure and manage telecommunication networks such as 5G networks. API refers to an interface and / or communication protocol between a client device 215 and a server, such that if a client issues a request in a predefined format, the client should receive a response in a specific format or cause a defined action to be initiated. In the context of a cloud provider network, an API provides a gateway for clients to access cloud infrastructure by allowing them to obtain data from a cloud provider network or cause an action within the cloud provider network, thereby enabling the development of applications that interact with resources and services hosted in a cloud provider network. APIs can also enable different services of a cloud provider network to exchange data with each other. Users can choose to deploy their virtual computing systems to provide network-based services for their own use and / or for use by their customers or clients.

[0044] Cloud provider network 203 may include a physical network (e.g., sheet metal boxes, cables, rack hardware) referred to as an underlay. The underlay may be considered a network fabric that contains the physical hardware that runs the provider network's services. The underlay may be isolated from the rest of cloud provider network 203, e.g., it may not be possible to route from an underlay network address to an address in a production network running a cloud provider service, or to a customer network hosting customer resources.

[0045] The cloud provider network 203 may also include an overlay network of virtualized computing resources running on the bottom layer. In at least some embodiments, the hypervisor or other device or process on the network bottom layer may use encapsulation protocol technology to encapsulate and route network packets (e.g., client IP packets) between client resource instances on different hosts in the provider network through the network bottom layer. Encapsulation protocol technology may be used on the network bottom layer to route encapsulated packets (also referred to as network bottom layer packets) between endpoints on the network bottom layer via an overlay network path or route. Encapsulation protocol technology may be viewed as providing a virtual network topology overlaid on the network bottom layer. Thus, network packets may be routed along the bottom layer network according to the construction in the overlay network (e.g., a virtual network that may be referred to as a virtual private cloud (VPC), a port / protocol firewall configuration that may be referred to as a security group). A mapping service (not shown) may coordinate the routing of these network packets. A mapping service may be a regional distributed lookup service that maps a combination of an overlay Internet protocol (IP) and a network identifier to the bottom layer IP so that a distributed bottom layer computing device may find where to send the packet.

[0046] For illustration, each physical host device (e.g., computing server, block storage server, object storage server, control server) may have an IP address in the underlying network. Hardware virtualization technology may enable multiple operating systems to run simultaneously on a host computer, for example as a virtual machine (VM) on a computing server. The hypervisor or virtual machine monitor (VMM) on the host allocates the hardware resources of the host between the various VMs on the host and monitors the execution of the VM. Each VM may be provided with one or more IP addresses in the overlay network, and the VMM on the host may know the IP address of the VM on the host. The VMM (and / or other devices or processes on the network bottom layer) may use encapsulation protocol technology to encapsulate network packets (e.g., client IP packets) and route the network packets between virtualized resources on different hosts within the cloud provider network 203 through the network bottom layer. Encapsulation protocol technology may be used on the network bottom layer to route encapsulated packets between endpoints on the network bottom layer via an overlay network path or route. Encapsulation protocol technology may be viewed as providing a virtual network topology overlaid on the network bottom layer. The encapsulation protocol technology may include a mapping service that maintains a mapping directory that maps IP overlay addresses (e.g., IP addresses visible to the customer) to underlying IP addresses (IP addresses not visible to the customer) that can be accessed by various processes on the cloud provider network 203 for routing packets between endpoints.

[0047] As shown, in various embodiments, the traffic and operations at the bottom layer of the cloud provider network can be broadly subdivided into two categories: control plane traffic carried on the logical control plane 218 and data plane operations carried on the logical data plane 221. While the data plane 221 represents the movement of user data through the distributed computing system, the control plane 218 represents the movement of control signals through the distributed computing system. The control plane 218 typically includes one or more control plane components or services distributed on and implemented by one or more control servers. Control plane traffic typically includes management operations, such as establishing isolated virtual networks for various customers, monitoring resource usage and health, identifying specific hosts or servers to start the requested computing instances, pre-configuring additional hardware as needed, and the like. The data plane 221 includes customer resources (e.g., computing instances, containers, block storage volumes, databases, file storage) implemented on the cloud provider network. Data plane traffic typically includes non-management operations, such as transmitting data to and from customer resources.

[0048] The control plane components are typically implemented on a set of servers separate from the data plane servers, and the control plane traffic and the data plane traffic can be sent over separate / different networks. In some embodiments, the control plane traffic and the data plane traffic can be supported by different protocols. In some embodiments, the message (e.g., packet) sent by the cloud provider network 203 includes a flag for indicating whether the traffic is control plane traffic or data plane traffic. In some embodiments, the payload of the traffic can be checked to determine its type (e.g., control plane or data plane). Other techniques for distinguishing traffic types are possible.

[0049] As shown, data plane 221 may include one or more computing servers, which may be bare metal (e.g., a single tenant) or may be virtualized by a hypervisor to run multiple VMs (sometimes referred to as "instances") or microVMs for one or more customers. These computing servers may support virtualized computing services (or "hardware virtualization services") for cloud provider networks. Virtualized computing services may be part of control plane 218, thereby allowing customers to issue commands via interface 206 (e.g., API) to start and manage computing instances (e.g., VMs, containers) of their applications. Virtualized computing services may provide virtual computing instances with different computing and / or memory resources. In one embodiment, each of the virtual computing instances may correspond to one of several instance types. The characteristics of an instance type may be its hardware type, computing resources (e.g., the number, type, and configuration of CPUs or CPU cores), memory resources (e.g., the capacity, type, and configuration of local memory), storage resources (e.g., the capacity, type, and configuration of locally accessible storage devices), network resources (e.g., the characteristics of its network interface and / or network capabilities), and / or other suitable descriptive characteristics. Using the instance type selection functionality, an instance type can be selected for a customer based, for example, at least in part, on input from the customer. For example, the customer can select an instance type from a set of predefined instance types. As another example, the customer can specify the desired resources for the instance type and / or the requirements of the workload that the instance will run, and the instance type selection functionality can select the instance type based on such specifications.

[0050] The data plane 221 may also include one or more block storage servers, which may include persistent storage devices for storing customer data volumes and software for managing these volumes. These block storage servers may support managed block storage services for the cloud provider network. The managed block storage service may be part of the control plane 218, allowing customers to issue commands via the interface 206 (e.g., API) to create and manage volumes for applications running on their computing instances. The block storage server includes one or more servers on which data is stored as blocks. A block is a sequence of bytes or bits, typically containing a certain integer number of records, with a maximum length of the block size. Blocked data is typically stored in a data buffer and the block data is read or written to the entire block at a time. Typically, a volume may correspond to a logical collection of data, such as a set of data maintained on behalf of a user. A user volume (which may be viewed as, for example, an individual hard drive ranging in size from 1GB to 1 terabyte (TB) or more) consists of one or more blocks stored on a block storage server. Although viewed as an individual hard drive, it should be understood that a volume may be stored as one or more virtualized devices implemented on one or more underlying physical host devices. A volume can be partitioned several times (e.g., up to 16 times), with each partition hosted by a different host. The data of a volume can be replicated between multiple devices within a cloud provider network to provide multiple copies of the volume (where such copies can collectively represent a volume on a computing system). Volume copies in a distributed computing system can, for example, be beneficially provided with automatic failover and recovery by allowing a user to access a primary copy of the volume or a secondary copy of the volume that is synchronized with the primary copy at a block level, so that the failure of the primary copy or the secondary copy does not prevent access to volume information. The role of the primary copy can be to facilitate reading and writing (sometimes referred to as "input and output operations" or simply "I / O operations") on the volume, and propagate any writes to the secondary copy (preferably synchronously propagated in the I / O path, but asynchronous replication can also be used). The secondary copy can be updated synchronously with the primary copy and provide a seamless transition during a failover operation, whereby the secondary copy assumes the role of the primary copy, and the previous primary copy is designated as a secondary copy or a new replacement secondary copy is provisioned. Although some examples in this article discuss primary and secondary copies, it should be understood that a logical volume can include multiple secondary copies. The computing instance can virtualize its I / O to the volume through the client. The client represents instructions that enable a computing instance to connect to a remote data volume (e.g., a data volume stored on a physically separate computing device accessed over a network) and perform I / O operations at the remote data volume. The client can be implemented on an offload card of a server that includes a processing unit (e.g., a CPU or a GPU) of the computing instance.

[0051] The data plane 221 may also include one or more object storage servers, which represent another type of storage device within the cloud provider network. The object storage server includes one or more servers on which data is stored as objects within a resource called a bucket and can be used to support the managed object storage service of the cloud provider network. Each object typically includes the stored data, a variable metadata that enables the object storage server to analyze the various capabilities of the stored object, and a globally unique identifier or key that can be used to retrieve the object. Each bucket is associated with a given user account. Customers can store many objects in their buckets, can write, read and delete objects in their buckets, and can control access to their buckets and the objects contained therein. In addition, in an embodiment with multiple different object storage servers distributed in different areas in the above-mentioned area, users can select the area (or multiple areas) of the storage bucket, for example to optimize latency. Customers can use buckets to store various types of objects, including machine images that can be used to start VMs, and snapshots representing point-in-time views of volume data.

[0052] The provider subnet extension 224 ("PSE") provides the resources and services of the cloud provider network 203 within a separate network (such as a telecommunications network), thereby extending the functionality of the cloud provider network 203 to new locations (e.g., for reasons related to latency of communicating with customer devices, legal compliance, security, etc.). In some embodiments, the PSE 224 can be configured to provide the capacity of cloud-based workloads to run within the telecommunications network. In some embodiments, the PSE 224 can be configured to provide core and / or RAN functions of the telecommunications network, and can be configured with additional hardware (e.g., radio access hardware). Some embodiments can be configured to allow both, for example by allowing unused capacity of the core and / or RAN functions to be used to run cloud-based workloads.

[0053] As indicated, such provider underlay extensions 224 may include cloud provider network managed provider underlay extensions 227 (e.g., formed by servers located in cloud provider managed facilities separate from those facilities associated with cloud provider network 203), communications service provider underlay extensions 230 (e.g., formed by servers associated with communications service provider facilities), customer managed provider underlay extensions 233 (e.g., formed by servers located locally at a customer or partner facility), and other possible types of underlay extensions.

[0054] As shown in the exemplary provider underlying extension 224, the provider underlying extension 224 can similarly include a logical separation between a control plane 236 and a data plane 239, which respectively extend the control plane 218 and the data plane 221 of the cloud provider network 203. The provider underlying extension 224 can be pre-configured with an appropriate combination of hardware and software and / or firmware elements, for example, by the cloud provider network operator to support various types of computing-related resources, and do so in a manner that reflects the experience of using the cloud provider network. For example, one or more provider underlying extension location servers can be pre-configured by the cloud provider to be deployed within the provider underlying extension 224. As described above, the cloud provider network 203 can provide a set of predefined instance types, each instance type having a different type and number of underlying hardware resources. Each instance type can also be provided in various sizes. In order to enable customers to continue to use the same instance types and sizes that they use in the region in the provider underlying extension 224, the server can be a heterogeneous server. A heterogeneous server can support multiple instance sizes of the same type at the same time, and can also be reconfigured to host any instance type supported by its underlying hardware resources. The reconfiguration of heterogeneous servers can occur on the fly using the available capacity of the servers, i.e., while other VMs are still running and consuming other capacity of the provider underlying extension location servers. This can improve the utilization of computing resources within the edge location by allowing better packaging of running instances on the servers, and also provide a seamless experience with regard to the use of instances on the cloud provider network 203 and the provider underlying extension 227 managed by the cloud provider network.

[0055] The provider underlying extension server can host one or more computing instances. The computing instance can be a VM, or a container that packages the code and all its dependencies, so that the application can run quickly and reliably across computing environments (e.g., including VMs and microVMs). In addition, if the customer needs, the server can host one or more data volumes. In the region of the cloud provider network 203, such volumes can be hosted on dedicated block storage servers. However, due to the possibility of having significantly smaller capacity at the provider underlying extension 224 than in the region, if the provider underlying extension 224 includes such a dedicated block storage server, it may not provide the best utilization experience. Therefore, the block storage service can be virtualized in the provider underlying extension 224, so that one of the VMs runs the block storage software and stores the data of the volume. Similar to the operation of the block storage service in the region of the cloud provider network 203, the volume within the provider underlying extension 224 can be replicated to achieve persistence and availability. The volume can be provisioned in its own isolated virtual network within the provider underlying extension 224. The computing instance and any volume together constitute the data plane 239 extension of the provider network data plane 221 within the provider underlying extension 224.

[0056] In some embodiments, servers within the provider underlay extension 224 may host certain local control plane components, such as components that enable the provider underlay extension 224 to continue to operate in the event of a loss of connectivity back to the cloud provider network 203. Examples of these components include a migration manager that can move compute instances between provider underlay extension servers if necessary to maintain availability, and a key value data store that indicates where volume replicas are located. However, the control plane 236 functionality typically used for the provider underlay extension will remain in the cloud provider network 203 to allow customers to use as much of the resource capacity of the provider underlay extension as possible.

[0057] The migration manager may have a centralized coordination component running in the region, and a local controller running on a PSE server (as well as a server in a cloud provider data center). When a migration is triggered, the centralized coordination component can identify the target edge location and / or the target host, and the local controller can coordinate the data transfer between the source host and the target host. The described resource movement between hosts in different locations can take one of several forms of migration. Migration refers to moving virtual machine instances (and / or other resources) between hosts in a cloud computing network or between hosts outside a cloud computing network and hosts within the cloud. There are different types of migration, including live migration and restart migration. During the restart migration, customers experience an interruption and effective power cycle of their virtual machine instances. For example, a control plane service can coordinate a restart migration workflow that involves dismantling the current domain on the original host and then creating a new domain for the virtual machine instance on the new host. The instance is restarted by shutting down on the original host and starting again on the new host.

[0058] Live migration refers to the process of moving a running virtual machine or application between different physical machines without significantly interrupting the availability of the virtual machine (e.g., end users will not notice the downtime of the virtual machine). When the control plane executes the live migration workflow, it can create a new "inactive" domain associated with the instance, while the original domain of the instance continues to run as the "active" domain. The virtual machine's memory (including any in-memory state of running applications), storage, and network connectivity are transferred from the original host with the active domain to the destination host with the inactive domain. The virtual machine may be briefly paused to prevent state changes while the memory contents are transferred to the destination host. The control plane can transition the inactive domain to become the active domain and demote the original active domain to become the inactive domain (sometimes called "flipping"), after which the inactive domain can be discarded.

[0059] The technology for various types of migration involves managing a key phase: the time that a virtual machine instance is unavailable to a customer, which should be kept as short as possible. In currently disclosed migration technologies, this can be particularly challenging because resources are moving between hosts in geographically separated locations that can be connected by one or more intermediate networks. For live migration, the disclosed technology can dynamically determine the amount of memory state data to be pre-copied (e.g., when the instance is still running on the source host) and to be post-copied (e.g., after the instance starts running on the destination host), for example, based on latency between locations, network bandwidth / usage patterns, and / or based on which memory pages are most often used by the instance. In addition, the specific time to transmit memory state data can be dynamically determined based on the network conditions between locations. This analysis can be performed by a migration management component in the region, or by a migration management component running locally in the source edge location. If the instance has access to a virtualized storage device, both the source domain and the target domain can be attached to the storage device at the same time to enable uninterrupted access to its data during migration and in the event that a rollback to the source domain is required.

[0060] The server software running on the provider underlay extension 224 may be designed by the cloud provider to run on the cloud provider underlay network, and the software may be able to run unmodified in the provider underlay extension 224 to create a private copy of the underlay network (“shadow underlay”) within the edge location by using a local network manager 242. The local network manager 242 may run on the provider underlay extension 224 server and bridge the shadow underlay with the provider underlay extension 224 network, for example, by acting as a virtual private network (VPN) endpoint or endpoint between the provider underlay extension 224 and the proxies 245, 248 in the cloud provider network 203 and by implementing a mapping service (for traffic encapsulation and decapsulation) to associate data plane traffic (from the data plane proxy 248) and control plane traffic (from the control plane proxy 245) with the appropriate servers. By implementing a local version of the provider network's underlay overlay mapping service, the local network manager 242 allows resources in the provider underlay extension 224 to communicate seamlessly with resources in the cloud provider network 203. In some embodiments, a single local network manager 242 may perform these actions for all servers hosting compute instances in the provider underlay extension 224. In other embodiments, each of the servers hosting the compute instances may have a dedicated local network manager 242. In a multi-rack edge location, inter-rack communications may go through the local network managers 242, where the local network managers maintain open tunnels between each other.

[0061] The provider underlying extension location can utilize secure networking tunnels through the provider underlying extension 224 network to the cloud provider network 203, for example, to maintain the security of customer data when traversing the provider underlying extension 224 network and any other intermediate networks (possibly including the public Internet). Within the cloud provider network 203, these tunnels consist of virtual infrastructure components including isolated virtual networks (e.g., in an overlay network), control plane agents 245, data plane agents 248, and underlying network interfaces. Such agents 245, 248 can be implemented as containers running on computing instances. In some embodiments, each server in the provider underlying extension 224 location hosting a computing instance can utilize at least two tunnels: one tunnel for control plane traffic (e.g., Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP) traffic) and one tunnel for encapsulated data plane traffic. A connectivity manager (not shown) within the cloud provider network 203 manages their cloud provider network-side lifecycles, for example, by automatically provisioning these tunnels and their components when needed and maintaining them in a healthy operating state. In some embodiments, a direct connection between the provider underlying extension 224 location and the cloud provider network 203 can be used for control and data plane communications. Compared to VPNs that go through other networks, direct connections can provide constant bandwidth and more consistent network performance because its network path is relatively fixed and stable.

[0062] A control plane (CP) agent 245 may be provisioned in the cloud provider network 203 to represent a specific host in an edge location. The CP agent 245 is an intermediary between the control plane 218 in the cloud provider network 203 and the control plane target in the control plane 236 of the provider bottom layer extension 224. That is, the CP agent 245 provides an infrastructure for tunneling management API traffic destined for the provider bottom layer extension server from the regional bottom layer to the provider bottom layer extension 224. For example, a virtualized computing service of the cloud provider network 203 may issue a command to the VMM of the server of the provider bottom layer extension 224 to start a computing instance. The CP agent 245 maintains a tunnel (e.g., VPN) to the local network manager 242 of the provider bottom layer extension. The software implemented in the CP agent 245 ensures that only well-formed API traffic leaves and returns to the bottom layer. The CP agent 245 provides a mechanism to expose remote servers on the cloud provider bottom layer while still protecting the bottom layer security materials (e.g., encryption keys, security tokens) from leaving the cloud provider network 203. The unidirectional control plane traffic tunnel imposed by the CP proxy 245 also prevents any (potentially compromised) device from calling back to the underlay. The CP proxy 245 may be instantiated one-to-one with a server at the provider underlay extension 224, or may be able to manage control plane traffic for multiple servers in the same provider underlay extension.

[0063] Data plane (DP) agent 248 can also be pre-configured in cloud provider network 203 to represent a specific server in provider bottom layer extension 224. DP agent 248 acts as a shadow or anchor point of the server and can be used by services in cloud provider network 203 to monitor the health status of the host (including its availability, used / idle computing and capacity, used / idle storage and capacity, and network bandwidth utilization / availability). DP agent 248 also allows isolated virtual networks to span provider bottom layer extension 224 and cloud provider network 203 by acting as an agent for servers in cloud provider network 203. Each DP agent 248 can be implemented as a packet forwarding computing instance or container. As shown, each DP agent 248 can maintain a VPN tunnel with a local network manager 242, and the local network manager manages the traffic to the server represented by DP agent 248. The tunnel can be used to send data plane traffic between provider bottom layer extension servers and cloud provider network 203. Data plane traffic flowing between the provider underlay extension 224 and the cloud provider network 203 may pass through the DP agent 248 associated with the provider underlay extension 224. For data plane traffic flowing from the provider underlay extension 224 to the cloud provider network 203, the DP agent 248 may receive the encapsulated data plane traffic, verify its correctness, and allow it to enter the cloud provider network 203. The DP agent 248 may forward the encapsulated traffic from the cloud provider network 203 directly to the provider underlay extension 224.

[0064] The local network manager 242 can provide secure network connectivity with the agents 245, 248 established in the cloud provider network 203. After the connection between the local network manager 242 and the agents 245, 248 has been established, the customer can issue commands via the interface 206 to use the provider underlying extension resources to instantiate a computing instance (and / or perform other operations using the computing instance) in a manner similar to the manner in which such commands would be issued for a computing instance hosted within the cloud provider network 203. From the customer's perspective, the customer can now seamlessly use local resources within the provider underlying extension (as well as resources located in the cloud provider network 203, if desired). The computing instance set up on the server at the provider underlying extension 224 can communicate with electronic devices located in the same network, as well as communicate with other resources set up in the cloud provider network 203 as needed. The local gateway 251 can be implemented to provide network connectivity between the provider underlying extension 224 and the network associated with the extension (e.g., the communication service provider network in the example of the communication service provider underlying extension 230).

[0065] There may be situations where data needs to be transferred between the object storage service and the provider base extension (PSE) 224. For example, the object storage service may store machine images used to start VMs, as well as snapshots representing point-in-time backups of volumes. The object gateway may be provided on a PSE server or dedicated storage device, and provides customers with a configurable per-bucket cache of the contents of their object storage buckets in the PSE 224 to minimize the impact of PSE regional latency on customer workloads. The object gateway may also temporarily store snapshot data from snapshots of volumes in the PSE 224, and then synchronize with the object server in the region when possible. The object gateway may also store machine images that the customer specifies for use within the PSE 224 or at the customer's premises. In some embodiments, data within the PSE 224 may be encrypted with a unique key, and for security reasons, the cloud provider may restrict the key from being shared from the region to the PSE 224. Therefore, data exchanged between the object storage server and the object gateway may utilize encryption, decryption, and / or re-encryption in order to preserve security boundaries regarding encryption keys or other sensitive data. The transformation agent can perform these operations and can create a PSE bucket (on the object storage server) using the PSE encryption key to store the snapshot data and the machine image data.

[0066] In the above manner, PSE 224 forms an edge location because it provides resources and services of cloud provider network 203 outside of traditional cloud provider data centers and closer to customer devices. Edge locations as referred to herein can be structured in a variety of ways. In some embodiments, edge locations can be an extension of the underlying cloud provider network, including a limited amount of capacity provided outside the availability zone (e.g., in a small data center of a cloud provider or in other facilities located near customer workloads and possibly far from any availability zone). Such edge locations can be referred to as "far zones" (due to being far from other availability zones) or "near zones" (due to being close to customer workloads). Near zones can be connected to publicly accessible networks such as the Internet in various ways (e.g., directly, via another network, or via a dedicated connection to a region). Although near zones typically have more limited capacity than a certain region, in some cases, near zones may have considerable capacity, such as thousands or more racks.

[0067] In some embodiments, an edge location may be an extension of the cloud provider network's underlying layer formed by one or more servers located locally at a customer or partner facility, where such servers communicate with nearby availability zones or regions of the cloud provider network over a network (e.g., a publicly accessible network such as the Internet). This type of underlying extension located outside of a cloud provider network data center may be referred to as an "outpost" of the cloud provider network. Some outposts may be integrated into a communications network, for example, as multi-access edge computing (MEC) sites, the physical infrastructure of which is distributed across telecommunication data centers, telecommunication aggregation sites, and / or telecommunication base stations within a telecommunication network. In a local example, the limited capacity of the outpost may be available only to the customer who owns the premises (and any other accounts permitted by the customer). In a telecommunication example, the limited capacity of the outpost may be shared among multiple applications (e.g., games, virtual reality applications, healthcare applications) that send data to users of the telecommunication network.

[0068] Edge locations may include data plane capacity that is at least partially controlled by a control plane of a nearby availability zone of a provider network. Thus, an availability zone group may include a "parent" availability zone and any "child" edge locations that are subordinate to the parent availability zone (e.g., at least partially controlled by its control plane). Certain limited control plane functionality (e.g., features that require low-latency communication with customer resources, and / or features that enable the edge location to continue to operate when disconnected from the parent availability zone) may also exist in some edge locations. Thus, in the above examples, an edge location refers to an extension of at least data plane capacity located at the edge of the cloud provider network, close to customer devices and / or workloads.

[0069] exist Figure 1A In the example of Figure 1A )、centralized computing device 115( Figure 1A ) and core computing device 118 ( Figure 1A ) can be implemented as a provider underlay extension 224 of the cloud provider network 203. The installation or location of the provider underlay extension 224 within the communication network 100 may vary depending on the specific network topology or architecture of the communication network 100. The provider underlay extension 224 can generally be connected to any location of the communication network 100 where packet-based traffic (e.g., IP-based traffic) can be interrupted. In addition, communications between a given provider underlay extension 224 and the cloud provider network 203 are generally securely transited through at least a portion of the communication network 100 (e.g., via a secure tunnel, a virtual private network, a direct connection, etc.).

[0070] In the 5G wireless network development work, edge locations can be considered as a possible implementation of multi-access edge computing (MEC). Such edge locations can be connected to various points in the 5G network, which provide interruptions for data traffic as part of the user plane function (UPF). Older wireless networks may also contain edge locations. For example, in a 3G wireless network, an edge location can be connected to a packet-switched network portion of the communication network 100, such as a connection to a serving general packet radio service support node (SGSN) or to a gateway general packet radio service support node (GGSN). In a 4G wireless network, an edge location can be connected to a serving gateway (SGW) or a packet data network gateway (PGW) as part of a core network or an evolved packet core (EPC). In some embodiments, traffic between the provider underlying extension 224 and the cloud provider network 203 can be interrupted from the communication network 100 without being routed through the core network.

[0071] In some embodiments, the provider underlay extension 224 can be connected to more than one communication network associated with a respective customer. For example, when two communication networks of the respective customers share or route traffic through a common point, the provider underlay extension 224 can be connected to both networks. For example, each customer can allocate a portion of its network address space to the provider underlay extension, and the provider underlay extension can include a router or gateway that can distinguish traffic exchanged with each of the communication networks 100. For example, traffic from one network to the provider underlay extension 224 may have a different destination IP address, source IP address, and / or virtual local area network (VLAN) tag than traffic received from another network. Traffic originating from the provider underlay extension to a destination on one of the networks can be similarly encapsulated with an appropriate VLAN tag, source IP address (e.g., from a pool allocated to the provider underlay extension from the destination network address space), and destination IP address.

[0072] Figure 2B An example 253 of cellularization and geographic distribution of the communication network 100 (FIG. 1) is depicted for providing a highly available user plane function (UPF). Figure 2BIn the example, user device 254 communicates with request router 255 to route the request to one of multiple control plane cells 257a and 257b. Each control plane cell 257 may include a network service API gateway 260, a network slice configuration 262, a network service monitoring function 264, site planning data 266 (including layout, device type, number of devices, etc. describing customer site requirements), a network service / function catalog 268, an orchestration function 270, and / or other components. A large control plane can be divided into multiple cells to reduce the possibility of large-scale errors affecting a wide range of customers, for example, by having one or more cells per customer, per network, or per independently operated area.

[0073] The network service / function directory 268 is also referred to as the NF repository function (NRF). In a service-based architecture (SBA) 5G network, control plane functions and a common data repository can be delivered through a set of interconnected network functions built using a microservice architecture. The NRF can maintain a record of available NF instances and the services they support, allowing other NF instances to subscribe and notify registrations from NF instances of a given type. Therefore, the NRF can support service discovery by receiving discovery requests from NF instances and detailed information about which NF instances support specific services. The network function orchestrator 270 can perform NF lifecycle management, including instantiation, outward expansion / inward expansion, performance measurement, event correlation, and termination. The network function orchestrator 270 can also load new NFs, manage migration to new or updated versions of existing NFs, identify NF sets suitable for specific network slices or larger networks, and orchestrate NFs between different computing devices and sites that constitute the radio-based private network 103.

[0074] The control plane cell 257 can communicate with one or more cell sites 272, one or more customer local data centers 274, one or more local zones 276, and one or more regional zones 278. The cell site 272 includes computing hardware 280 that executes one or more distributed unit (DU) network functions 282. The customer local data center 274 includes computing hardware 283 that executes one or more DU or central unit (CU) network functions 284, a network controller, a UPF 286, one or more edge applications 287 corresponding to customer workloads, and / or other components.

[0075] The local region 276 (which may be located in a data center operated by a cloud service provider) may execute one or more core network functions 288, such as AMF, SMF, a network open function (NEF) that securely exposes the services and capabilities of other network functions, and a unified data management (UDM) function that manages subscriber data for authorization, registration, and mobility management. The local region 276 may also execute UPF 286, a metric processing service 289, and one or more edge applications 287.

[0076] A regional zone 278 (which may be located in a data center operated by a cloud service provider) may execute one or more core network functions 288; a UPF 286; an operations support system (OSS) 290 that supports network management systems, service delivery, service implementation, service assurance, and customer service; an Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) 291; a business support system (BSS) 292 that supports product management, customer management, revenue management, and / or order management; one or more portal applications 293, and / or other components.

[0077] In this example, the communication network 100 employs a cellular architecture to reduce the blast radius of each component. At the top level, the control plane is located in multiple control plane cells 257 to prevent a single control plane failure from affecting all deployments.

[0078] Within each control plane cell 257, multiple redundant stacks may be provided, with the control plane shifting traffic to secondary stacks as needed. For example, a cell site 272 may be configured to utilize a nearby local region 276 as its default core network. In the event that the local region 276 experiences an outage, the control plane may redirect the cell site 272 to use a backup stack in a regional region 278. Traffic that would normally be routed from the Internet to the local region 276 may be shifted to endpoints in the regional region 278. Each control plane cell 278 may implement a "stateless" architecture that shares a common session database across multiple sites, such as across availability zones or edge sites.

[0079] Figure 3 An example of an underlying extension 224 (including geographically dispersed providers) is shown according to some embodiments. Figure 2A) (or "edge location 303"). As shown, the cloud provider network 203 can be formed into multiple regions 306, where a region is a separate geographic area in which a cloud provider has one or more data centers 309. Each region 306 may include two or more availability zones (AZs) connected to each other via a dedicated high-speed network such as, for example, a fiber optic communication connection. An availability zone refers to an isolated fault domain that includes one or more data center facilities that have separate power, separate networking, and separate cooling relative to other availability zones. Cloud providers may strive to locate availability zones within a region far enough apart from each other that natural disasters, large-scale power outages, or other unexpected events do not take more than one availability zone offline at the same time. Customers can connect to resources within an availability zone of the cloud provider network via a publicly accessible network (e.g., the Internet, a cellular communication network, a communication service provider network). A transit center (TC) is the main backbone location that links customers to the cloud provider network and can be co-located in other network provider facilities (e.g., an Internet service provider, a telecommunications provider). Two or more TCs can be operated per region for redundancy. The regions 306 are connected to a global network that includes private networking infrastructure (e.g., fiber optic connections controlled by a cloud service provider) that connects each region 306 to at least one other region. Cloud provider network 203 can deliver content from points of presence (PoPs) that are external to but networked with these regions 306 through edge locations 303 and regional edge cache servers. This division and geographic distribution of computing hardware enables cloud provider network 203 to provide customers with low-latency resource access with a high degree of fault tolerance and stability on a global scale.

[0080] The number of edge locations 303 can be much higher than the number of regional data centers or availability zones. This widespread deployment of edge locations 303 can provide low-latency connectivity to the cloud for a much larger group of end-user devices (compared to those end-user devices that happen to be very close to regional data centers). In some embodiments, each edge location 303 can be peered to a portion of the cloud provider network 203 (e.g., a parent availability zone or regional data center). This peering allows various components operating in the cloud provider network 203 to manage the computing resources of the edge location 303. In some cases, multiple edge locations 303 can be located or installed in the same facility (e.g., separate racks of computer systems) and managed by different zones or data centers to provide additional redundancy. It should be noted that although edge locations 303 are generally described herein as being located within a communications service provider network or a radio-based private network 103 ( Figure 1A), but in some cases, such as when cloud provider network facilities are relatively close to communications service provider facilities, edge location 303 can remain within the physical premises of cloud provider network 203 while being connected to the communications service provider network via fiber optic or other network links.

[0081] Edge location 303 can be structured in many ways.In some embodiments, edge location 303 can be an extension of the underlying cloud provider network, including a limited amount of capacity provided outside the available zone (e.g., in a small data center of a cloud provider or located near the customer workload and possibly away from other settings of any available zone).Such edge location 303 can be referred to as a local area (therefore more local or closer to a group of users than traditional available zones). The local area can be connected to a public accessible network such as the Internet in various ways (e.g., directly, via another network or via a dedicated connection with region 306).Although usually the local area has a more limited capacity than region 306, in some cases, the local area may have considerable capacity, such as thousands or more racks.Some local areas can use infrastructure similar to a typical cloud provider data center, rather than the edge location 303 infrastructure described herein.

[0082] As indicated herein, the cloud provider network 203 can be formed into multiple regions 306, where each region 306 represents a geographic region in which the cloud provider clusters data centers. Each region 306 can also include multiple (e.g., two or more) availability zones (AZs) connected to each other via a dedicated high-speed network such as a fiber optic communication connection. The AZ can provide an isolated fault domain including one or more data center facilities, which have separate power supplies, separate networking, and separate cooling relative to those data center facilities in another AZ. Preferably, the AZs within a region 306 are far enough apart from each other that the same natural disaster (or other failure-inducing event) does not affect more than one AZ at the same time or take more than one AZ offline. Customers can connect to the AZs of the cloud provider network via a publicly accessible network (e.g., the Internet, a cellular communication network).

[0083] A given edge location 303 as a parent of an AZ or region 306 of a cloud provider network 203 can be based on many factors. One such parent factor is data sovereignty. For example, in order to keep data originating from a communication network in a certain country in the country, an edge location 303 deployed in the communication network can be a parent of an AZ or region 306 of the country. Another factor is the availability of services. For example, some edge locations 303 may have different hardware configurations, such as whether there are components, such as local non-volatile storage devices (e.g., solid-state drives), graphics accelerators, etc. for customer data. Some AZs or regions 306 may lack services that utilize these additional resources, so the edge location can be a parent of an AZ or region 306 that supports the use of these resources. Another factor is the latency between an AZ or region 306 and an edge location 303. Although there are latency benefits to deploying edge locations 303 in a communication network, those benefits may be offset by using edge locations 303 as parents of distant AZs or regions 306, which can introduce significant latency to edge location 303 to regional traffic. Thus, edge location 303 is typically a parent of a nearby (in terms of network latency) AZ or zone 306 .

[0084] refer to Figure 4 , a networked environment 400 according to various embodiments is shown. The networked environment 400 includes a computing environment 403, one or more client devices 406, one or more pre-deployed devices 409, a spectrum reservation service 410, and one or more radio-based private networks 103, which communicate data with each other via a network 412. The network 412 includes, for example, the Internet, an intranet, an extranet, a wide area network (WAN), a local area network (LAN), a wired network, a wireless network, a cable TV network, a satellite network, or other suitable networks, or any combination of two or more such networks.

[0085] The computing environment 403 may include, for example, a server computer or any other system that provides computing capacity. Optionally, the computing environment 403 may employ multiple computing devices, which may be arranged, for example, in one or more server groups or computer groups or other arrangements. Such computing devices may be located in a single device or may be distributed in many different geographical locations. For example, the computing environment 403 may include multiple computing devices, which together may include hosted computing resources, grid computing resources, and / or any other distributed computing arrangements. In some cases, the computing environment 403 may correspond to an elastic computing resource, in which the allocated capacity of processing, network, storage, or other computing-related resources may vary over time. For example, the computing environment 403 may correspond to a cloud provider network 203 ( Figure 2A ), where customers are charged based on their usage of computing resources based on a utility computing model.

[0086] In some embodiments, computing environment 403 may correspond to a virtualized private network within a physical network, including, for example, virtual machine instances executed on physical computing hardware through a hypervisor. The virtual machine instances and any containers running on these instances may obtain network connectivity through virtualized network components enabled by physical network components, such as routers and switches.

[0087] According to various embodiments, various applications and / or other functions may be executed in the computing environment 403. In addition, various data are stored in a data storage area 415 accessible to the computing environment 403. It is understood that the data storage area 415 may represent a plurality of data storage areas 415. The data stored in the data storage area 415 is associated with the operation of various applications and / or functional entities described below, for example.

[0088] The computing environment 403, which is part of a cloud provider network that provides utility computing services, includes computing devices 418 and other types of computing devices. The computing devices 418 may correspond to different types of computing devices 418 and may have different computing architectures. The computing architectures may differ by using processors with different architectures, such as x86, x86_64, ARM, Scalable Processor Architecture (SPARC), PowerPC, etc. For example, some computing devices 418 may have x86 processors, while other computing devices 418 may have ARM processors. The computing devices 418 may also differ in available hardware resources, such as local storage, graphics processing units (GPUs), machine learning extensions, and other features.

[0089] The computing device 418 can have various forms of allocated computing capacity 421, which can include virtual machine (VM) instances, containers, serverless functions, and the like. VM instances can be instantiated from VM images. To this end, a customer can specify that a virtual machine instance should be launched in a specific type of computing device 418, but not in other types of computing devices 418. In various examples, a VM instance can be executed alone on a specific computing device 418, or multiple VM instances can be executed on a specific computing device 418. In addition, a specific computing device 418 can execute different types of VM instances, which can provide different amounts of available resources via the computing device 418. For example, some types of VM instances may provide more memory and processing power than other types of VM instances.

[0090] Components executing on computing environment 403 include, for example, radio-based private network (RBPN) management service 424, RBPN hardware configuration service 427, RBPN hardware deployment service 430, capacity management service 433, and other applications, services, processes, systems, engines, or functions not discussed in detail herein.

[0091] The RBPN management service 424 is executed to manage, configure, and monitor the radio-based private network 103 operated by the cloud service provider on behalf of the customer. To this end, the RBPN management service 424 can generate multiple user interfaces that allow customers to order new radio-based private networks 103, expand or reduce existing radio-based private networks 103, modify the operation of existing radio-based private networks 103, configure wireless devices 106 ( Figure 1A ), provide statistics and metrics about the operation of the radio-based private network 103, reserve spectrum for the customer's private network via the spectrum reservation service 410, and the like. For example, the RBPN management service 424 can generate one or more network pages, such as web pages, including a user interface. Moreover, the RBPN management service 424 can support this function through an API that can be called by the client application 436. In addition to facilitating interaction with the user, the RBPN management service 424 also implements the deployment and configuration changes of the radio-based private network 103 and the continuous monitoring of performance parameters. In some cases, the RBPN management service 424 can generate a network plan 439 for the customer based at least in part on the specifications of the customer's location, automated site surveys by unmanned aerial vehicles, and / or other input parameters.

[0092] RBPN hardware configuration service 427 is executed to implement configuration changes to the hardware that implements the radio-based private network 103. This can include radio units, antennas, VM instances or containers that perform network functions, routers, switches, fiber optic terminal equipment, etc. For example, an antenna can be configured to operate at a specific frequency. The radio unit can be programmed to operate at a specific frequency, join a specific radio-based private network 103, and backhaul traffic to a specific VM instance or container.

[0093] In some scenarios, the RBPN hardware configuration service 427 is executed to reconfigure hardware that already exists in the radio-based private network 103. In other scenarios, the RBPN hardware configuration service 427 is executed to preconfigure a set of hardware to be deployed to an existing or new radio-based private network 103. To this end, the RBPN hardware configuration service 427 can implement the configuration on one or more pre-deployment devices 409 that are temporarily connected to the network 412 to facilitate pre-configuration before the pre-deployment devices 409 are shipped to the customer for deployment in the radio-based private network 103.

[0094] RBPN hardware deployment service 430 is executed to automate and arrange the deployment of hardware to implement the radio-based private network 103. Based on the network plan 439 submitted by the customer or generated for the customer, RBPN hardware deployment service 430 can arrange the purchase of hardware components required for implementing the radio-based private network 103 according to the network plan 439. This may involve automatically placing orders with suppliers to purchase new equipment, retaining equipment already in the provider's inventory, or reallocating equipment that already exists at the customer site or other customer sites (where the equipment to be reallocated is no longer used). In this regard, RBPN hardware deployment service 430 can send instructions to customers to return equipment that is no longer in use, wherein the equipment can be sent directly to other customers for use in another deployment. In another scenario, RBPN hardware deployment service 430 can send instructions to customers to move a piece of equipment from a site where the equipment is no longer used to another site where the equipment will be used. RBPN hardware deployment service 430 can manage the connection of equipment to network 412 to preconfigure as pre-deployed device 409. RBPN hardware deployment services 430 may also arrange for shipment of equipment to a customer location, including multiple customer locations that may correspond to various cell sites.

[0095] Capacity management services 433 are performed to manage computing capacity in the radio-based private network 103 and the associated core network. This may involve shifting computing capacity from network function workloads to customer workloads and vice versa. In addition, unused computing capacity may be shifted from one customer to another. Furthermore, network function workloads may be shifted from one cell 109 ( Figure 1A ) distributed computing device 112 at the site, centralized computing device 115 at the customer site ( Figure 1A ) and the core computing device 118 ( Figure 1A ) between.

[0096] The data stored in the data storage area 415 includes, for example, one or more network plans 439, one or more cellular topologies 442, one or more spectrum allocations 445, device data 448, one or more RBPN metrics 451, customer billing data 454, radio unit configuration data 457, antenna configuration data 460, network function configuration data 463, one or more network function workloads 466, one or more customer workloads 469, and possibly other data.

[0097] The network plan 439 is a specification of a radio-based private network 103 to be deployed for a customer. For example, the network plan 439 may include the location of premises or geographic areas to be covered, the number of cells, device identification information and permissions, the expected maximum network latency, the expected bandwidth or network throughput for one or more classes of devices, one or more quality of service parameters for applications or services, and / or other parameters that can be used to create a radio-based private network 103. The customer can manually specify one or more of these parameters via a user interface. One or more parameters can be pre-filled with default parameters. In some cases, the network plan 439 can be generated for the customer based at least in part on an automated site survey using an unmanned aerial vehicle. The parameter values ​​defining the network plan 439 can be used as a basis for the cloud service provider to bill the customer under a utility computing model. For example, in a service level agreement (SLA), a customer may be charged higher fees for lower latency targets and / or higher bandwidth targets, and customers may be charged per device, per cell, based on the geographic area of ​​service, based on spectrum availability, etc. In some cases, network plan 439 may include thresholds and reference parameters determined at least in part based on automatic detection of the customer's existing private network.

[0098] The cellular topology 442 includes an arrangement of multiple cells for customers that takes into account spectrum reuse given the location of the cells. The cellular topology 442 can be automatically generated given a site survey. In some cases, the number of cells in the cellular topology 442 can be automatically determined based on the desired geographic area to be covered, the availability of backhaul connections at various sites, signal propagation, available spectrum, and / or other parameters. For a radio-based private network 103, the cellular topology 442 can be developed to cover one or more buildings on an organizational campus, one or more schools in a school district, one or more buildings in a university or university system, and other areas.

[0099] Spectrum allocation 445 includes spectrum available for allocation to radio-based private network 103 and spectrum currently allocated to radio-based private network 103. Spectrum may include spectrum that is publicly accessible without restriction, spectrum that is personally owned or leased by customers, spectrum that is owned or leased by providers, spectrum that is free to use but requires reservation, etc.

[0100] The device data 448 corresponds to data describing the devices 106 that are allowed to connect to the radio-based private network 103. The device data 448 includes the corresponding user, account information, billing information, data plan, allowed applications or uses, an indication of whether the wireless device 106 is mobile or fixed, location, current cell, network address, device identifier (e.g., International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number, Equipment Serial Number (ESN), Media Access Control (MAC) address, Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) number, etc.), etc.

[0101] RBPN metrics 451 include various metrics or statistics that indicate the performance or health of the radio-based private network 103. Such RBPN metrics 451 may include bandwidth metrics, packet drop metrics, signal strength metrics, latency metrics, etc. RBPN metrics 451 may be aggregated on a per-device basis, a per-cell basis, a per-client basis, etc.

[0102] The customer billing data 454 specifies charges incurred by the customer as a result of the provider operating the radio-based private network 103 for the customer. Charges may include fixed costs based on the equipment deployed to the customer and / or usage costs based on utilization determined by tracked usage metrics. In some cases, the customer may purchase the equipment upfront and may only have to pay for bandwidth or backend network costs. In other cases, the customer may not incur any upfront costs and may be charged only based on usage. By providing equipment to customers based on a utility computing model, the cloud service provider can select the optimal configuration of equipment to meet customer target performance metrics while avoiding over-provisioning of unnecessary hardware.

[0103] Radio unit configuration data 457 may correspond to configuration settings of radio units deployed in radio-based private network 103. Such settings may include frequencies to use, protocols to use, modulation parameters, bandwidth, network routing and / or backhaul configuration, etc.

[0104] Antenna configuration data 460 may correspond to configuration settings for the antenna, including the frequency to be used, azimuth, vertical or horizontal orientation, beam tilt, and / or other parameters that may be controlled automatically or manually by instructing a user to mount the antenna in a certain manner or to make physical changes to the antenna (e.g., by connecting to a network of motors and controls on the antenna).

[0105] The network function configuration data 463 corresponds to configuration settings for configuring the operation of various network functions for the radio-based private network 103. In various embodiments, the network functions may be deployed in VM instances or containers located in a computing device 418, which is located at a cell site, a customer aggregation site, or a data center remote from the customer. Non-limiting examples of network functions may include access and mobility management functions, session management functions, user plane functions, policy control functions, authentication server functions, unified data management functions, application functions, network exposure functions, network function repositories, network slice selection functions, and / or other functions. The network function workload 466 corresponds to a machine image, container, or function to be launched in the allocated computing capacity 421 to perform one or more network functions.

[0106] Customer workloads 469 correspond to customer machine images, containers, or functions that can be executed in conjunction with or in place of network function workloads 466 in allocated computing capacity 421. For example, customer workloads 469 can provide or support customer applications or services. In various examples, customer workloads 469 relate to factory automation, autonomous robotics, augmented reality, virtual reality, design, monitoring, and the like.

[0107] Client device 406 represents a plurality of client devices 406 that may be coupled to network 412. Client device 406 may include, for example, a processor-based system, such as a computer system. Such a computer system may be embodied in the form of a desktop computer, a laptop computer, a personal digital assistant, a cellular phone, a smart phone, a set-top box, a music player, a webpad, a tablet computer system, a game console, an e-book reader, a smart watch, a head-mounted display, a voice interface device, or other device. Client device 406 may include a display including, for example, one or more devices such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), a gas plasma-based flat panel display, an organic light emitting diode (OLED) display, an electrophoretic ink (E-ink) display, an LCD projector, or other types of display devices, etc.

[0108] The client device 406 may be configured to execute various applications, such as the client application 436 and / or other applications. The client application 436 may be executed in the client device 406, for example, to access network content provided by the computing environment 403 and / or other servers, thereby presenting a user interface on a display. To this end, the client application 436 may include, for example, a browser, a dedicated application, etc., and the user interface may include a network page, an application screen, etc. The client device 406 may be configured to execute applications other than the client application 436, such as, for example, an email application, a social networking application, a word processor, a spreadsheet, and / or other applications.

[0109] In some embodiments, spectrum reservation service 410 provides spectrum reservation for a customer's private network. In one scenario, spectrum reservation service 410 is operated by an entity such as a third party to manage reservations and coexistence in a publicly accessible spectrum. An example of such a spectrum is Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS). In another scenario, spectrum reservation service 410 is operated by a telecommunications service provider to sell or sublicense portions of spectrum owned or licensed by the provider.

[0110] Next reference Figure 5 , shows a flowchart of an example of the operation of providing a portion of the RBPN management service 424 according to various embodiments. It can be understood that Figure 5 The flowchart of is merely an example of many different types of functional arrangements that may be used to implement the operation of portions of the RBPN management service 424 as described herein. Figure 5 The flowchart may be viewed as depicting a computing environment 403 ( Figure 4 ) is an example of an element of a method implemented in ).

[0111] Starting from block 503, the RBPN management service 424 generates a method for ordering or provisioning RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) of the user interface. For example, the user interface may include a user interface for specifying network planning 439 ( Figure 4 ) or network plan 439. Such parameters may include, for example, the number of cells, a map or site plan of customer premises or geographic areas to be covered, target bandwidth, information about wireless devices 106 ( Figure 1A ) or user information, target minimum delay, expected cost and / or other parameters. The user interface may include a component for uploading one or more data files including this information. The user interface may be provided as a web page or other web data via the network 412 ( Figure 4 ) for transmission to the client device 406 ( Figure 4) executed in the client application 436 ( Figure 4 Optionally, the client application 436 may make one or more API calls to place an order with a provider or to provision a RBPN.

[0112] In box 506, RBPN management service 424 receives a request from the organization to provision a RBPN. For example, a user may submit a form or otherwise interact with a user interface to have the request submitted. Alternatively, client application 436 may make one or more API calls to request provisioning of a RBPN.

[0113] In box 507, RBPN management service 424 can automatically initiate detection of the existing private network of the organization. For example, the organization may have an existing network, such as a wired, Ethernet, Wi-Fi network or other type of network. When receiving appropriate security credentials and access to endpoints on the network, RBPN management service 424 can automatically detect the network to determine the customer's demand for a new RBPN 103 and an associated core network. For example, RBPN management service 424 can automatically determine the number of user devices on the existing network, the network bandwidth and request volume associated with various applications or services, the existing delay observed for accessing various applications or services, the reliability of existing systems, etc. These observations can be used to set the initial thresholds for the delay, bandwidth, etc. in the RBPN to be deployed.

[0114] In block 509, RBPN management service 424 determines the cell 109 in RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) arrangement. The arrangement may be determined to optimally cover one or more buildings of the organization. Both interior and exterior areas of the buildings may be covered as desired. The determination may include receiving information about the coverage areas, including indoor and outdoor coverage areas, the number of devices to be connected, and the layout of physical network connections and power sources. In this regard, the RBPN management service 424 may determine the number of cells 109 based on the network plan 439. Optionally, the RBPN management service 424 may automatically determine the optimal number of cells 109 based at least in part on parameters such as target latency, bandwidth, signal strength, and reliability in view of the customer areas and / or premises to be covered. In one embodiment, an unmanned aerial vehicle may be used to conduct a site survey of the area to be covered, potentially recording signal strength to observe the state of the spectrum to determine available frequencies. The RBPN management service 424 may record the cellular topology 442 ( Figure 4) in the arrangement of cells 109. In some scenarios, RBPN management service 424 can use machine learning to determine the best arrangement of cells 109 by deploying various arrangements of RBPN 103 and evaluating the performance. Over time, by observing these deployments, RBPN management service 424 can learn which arrangements perform better or worse than other arrangements, and use these results to train a machine learning model.

[0115] In block 512, RBPN management service 424 automatically reserves a spectrum allocation for RBPN 103. To this end, RBPN management service 424 may automatically determine available frequencies for cellular topology 442 from publicly available frequencies, customer-owned frequencies, and / or provider-owned frequencies. The frequency determination may take into account polarization, directivity, beam tilt, and / or other factors that may allow or interfere with frequency reuse. RBPN management service 424 may record the reservation in spectrum allocation 445 ( Figure 4 In addition, the RBPN management service 424 can communicate with external services (such as the spectrum reservation service 410 ( Figure 4 )) communications to make reservations and / or determine available frequencies.

[0116] In block 515, the RBPN management service 424 identifies the equipment needed to implement the RBPN 103. This may include antennas, radio units, and equipment for implementing the provider underlay extension 224 ( Figure 2A ) of the customer's building. In some cases, the computing device may be included in an external unit to be installed outside the customer's building. In some examples, such a unit may be stand-alone except for power and network connections. In some scenarios, the RBPN Management Service 424 may use machine learning to determine the optimal arrangement of the equipment by deploying various arrangements of the RBPN 103 and evaluating performance. Over time, by observing these deployments, the RBPN Management Service 424 may learn which arrangements perform better or worse than other arrangements, and use these results to train a machine learning model.

[0117] RBPN management service 424 can also determine the optimal distribution of each customer's equipment through machine learning. For example, only in the data center core computing device 118 ( Figure 1A ) to run network function workloads for specific types of customers 466( Figure 4 ) may make sense, while for another type of client, it may make sense to use the distributed computing device 112 ( Figure 1A ) or centralized computing device 115 ( Figure 1A) may be optimal to run network function workload 466 at . Therefore, RBPN management service 424 may determine not to deploy computing devices 112 or 115, in favor of a cloud-only deployment of computing device 118.

[0118] In block 518, RBPN management service 424 communicates with RBPN hardware deployment service 430 ( Figure 4 ) Initiate procurement of equipment for RBPN 103. This may include automatically reserving equipment from a provider's existing inventory, and / or placing one or more equipment orders with one or more suppliers.

[0119] In block 521, the RBPN management service 424 causes the RBPN hardware configuration service 427 ( Figure 4 ) pre-configure one or more devices, such as computing devices, radio units, antennas, routers, etc., for implementing network functions. Such devices can be used as pre-deployed devices 409 ( Figure 4 ) is connected to the network 412. The RBPN hardware configuration service 427 uses the radio unit configuration data 457 ( Figure 4 )、antenna configuration data 460( Figure 4 ) and network function configuration data 463( Figure 4 ) to implement pre-configuration.

[0120] In box 522, the RBPN management service 424 can configure one or more network slices for the radio-based private network 103, which can provide differentiated quality of service levels for different user devices, applications, or services. The quality of service levels can provide different delays, bandwidth / throughputs, signal strengths, reliability, and / or other service factors. For example, a customer may have a group of devices that require very low latency, so the RBPN management service 424 can configure network slices to provide latency below a threshold for these devices. In another example, a first quality of service level can be provided for a first application, and a second quality of service level can be provided for a second application.

[0121] In block 524, RBPN management service 424 causes RBPN hardware deployment service 430 to ship the device including pre-configured pre-deployment equipment 409 to the customer. Various instructions for installing the device may be transmitted to the customer via client application 436. Thereafter, the operation of the portion of RBPN management service 424 ends.

[0122] Move to Figure 6 , shows a flowchart of an example of the operation of providing another portion of the RBPN management service 424 according to various embodiments. It can be understood that Figure 6The flowchart of is merely an example of many different types of functional arrangements that may be used to implement the operation of portions of the RBPN management service 424 as described herein. Figure 6 The flowchart may be viewed as depicting a computing environment 403 ( Figure 4 ) is an example of an element of a method implemented in ).

[0123] Beginning at block 603, the RBPN management service 424 receives an activation RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) request. For example, a client user may interact with a user interface generated by RBPN management service 424 to select an option to activate RBPN 103. Optionally, client application 436 ( Figure 4 ) can make an API call to activate RBPN 103.

[0124] In block 606, the RBPN management service 424 causes one or more network function workloads 466 ( Figure 4 ) in the allocated computing capacity 421( Figure 4 ) is started in. Note that the network function workload 466 can be hosted on the computing device 418 ( Figure 4 ) on a computing device located on a provider bottom layer extension 224 ( Figure 2A ), the provider underlay extension can be located at cell sites, customer sites and / or data centers for core network functions.

[0125] In some scenarios, customers may prefer to provision the entire core network or all network function workloads 466 of the core network in a data center operated by a cloud service provider. This will reduce the number of devices maintained at the customer site, thereby potentially reducing the customer's need for information technology personnel. In other scenarios, customers may prefer to be on-site as much as possible to ensure that the customer has control over their own data. In some scenarios, customers may choose to offload network function workloads 466 from the cloud provider network 203 ( Figure 2A ) to the customer's premises, or from the customer's premises to the cloud provider network 203. An application programming interface (API) may be provided to the customer to manage where the network function workload 466 is hosted. Thus, a customer may request that a network function workload 406 be transferred from a cloud provider network 203 to a provider underlying extension 224 on the customer's premises, and the cloud provider network 203 may implement the transfer in response to the request. Similarly, a customer may request that a network function workload 406 be transferred from a provider underlying extension 224 on the customer's premises to a cloud provider network 203, and the cloud provider network 203 may implement the transfer in response to the request. In some scenarios, region 306 ( Figure 3) can go to the allocated computing capacity 421 in the data center in region 306, while local network traffic can remain at the customer's premises.

[0126] In block 609, the RBPN management service 424 determines whether the devices and equipment of the RBPN 103 are properly connected. Since the devices and equipment can be configured by the customer for plug-and-play operation, the RBPN management service 424 can perform diagnostic evaluations to confirm that the instructions are followed and the devices are powered and accessible via the network connection. In block 612, the RBPN management service 424 proceeds to activate the RBPN 103, thereby enabling the wireless device 106 to communicate with other hosts on the RBPN 103 and / or with hosts on the Internet through the RBPN 103. Thereafter, the operation of the portion of the RBPN management service 424 ends.

[0127] continue Figure 7 , shows a flowchart of an example of the operation of providing another portion of the RBPN management service 424 according to various embodiments. It can be understood that Figure 7 The flowchart of is merely an example of many different types of functional arrangements that can be used to implement the operation of other portions of the RBPN management service 424 as described herein. Figure 7 The flowchart may be viewed as depicting a computing environment 403 ( Figure 4 ) is an example of an element of a method implemented in ).

[0128] Beginning at block 703, the RBPN management service 424 monitors the RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) performance and utilization metrics. For example, RBPN management service 424 may collect RBPN metrics 451 ( ) related to dropped packets, latency values, bandwidth utilization, signal strength, interference, etc. during operation of RBPN 103. Figure 4 In block 706, RBPN management service 424 determines to modify RBPN 103 based at least in part on the performance metric and / or the utilization metric and / or the client request to modify RBPN 103. For example, RBPN management service 424 may determine that observed performance falls below a minimum threshold, or that observed utilization exceeds a maximum threshold. In this case, RBPN management service 424 may automatically scale VM instances, containers, functions, or other allocated computing capacity 421 ( Figure 4) . Optionally, a customer may submit a request to modify the RBPN 103 via the user interface or API. Such a request may include OSS and BSS management requests to specify access levels for specific devices or groups of devices on the RBPN 103. The RBPN Management Service 424 may run network bandwidth and verification tests to provide monitoring and alerting capabilities to enable full visibility into how the RBPN 103 is being used.

[0129] In block 709, RBPN management service 424 determines the cell 109 in RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) of the updated arrangement. In this regard, the RBPN management service 424 can be based on the updated network plan 439 ( Figure 4 ) determines the number of cells 109. Optionally, the RBPN management service 424 can automatically determine an updated optimal number of cells 109 based at least in part on parameters such as target latency, bandwidth, signal strength, and reliability in view of the customer area and / or premises to be covered. In one embodiment, an unmanned aerial vehicle can be used to conduct an updated site survey of the area to be covered, potentially recording signal strength to observe the state of the spectrum to determine available frequencies or to determine where cells 109 may exhibit poor performance. The RBPN management service 424 can record the cellular topology 442 ( Figure 4 ) in the updated arrangement of cell 109.

[0130] In block 712, RBPN management service 424 may automatically identify and / or reserve updated spectrum allocations for RBPN 103. To this end, RBPN management service 424 may automatically determine available frequencies for cellular topology 442 from publicly available frequencies, customer-owned frequencies, and / or provider-owned frequencies. Frequency determination may take into account polarization, directivity, beam tilt, and / or other factors that may allow or interfere with frequency reuse. RBPN management service 424 may record the updated reservation in spectrum allocation 445 ( Figure 4 ) In addition, RBPN management service 424 can be connected via network 412 ( Figure 4 ) communicates with an external service implementing the spectrum reservation system, such as spectrum reservation service 410, to make an updated reservation and / or determine available frequencies. The updated reservation may include releasing a previously reserved spectrum and / or changing to a different spectrum in various scenarios.

[0131] In block 715, the RBPN management service 424 identifies the equipment required to implement the modified RBPN 103. This may include antennas, radio units, and equipment for implementing the provider underlay extension 224 ( Figure 2A) computing devices, cables, switches, routers, fiber optic termination devices, etc. In block 718, the RBPN management service 424 deploys the RBPN hardware via the RBPN hardware deployment service 430 ( Figure 4 ) Initiate procurement of equipment for the updated RBPN 103. This may include automatically reserving equipment from the provider's existing inventory, and / or placing one or more equipment orders with one or more suppliers. Some or all of the existing equipment may be reused.

[0132] In block 721, RBPN management service 424 causes RBPN hardware configuration service 427 ( Figure 4 ) pre-configure one or more new devices, such as computing devices, radio units, antennas, routers, etc. that implement network functions. Such devices can be used as pre-deployed devices 409 ( Figure 4 ) is connected to the network 412. The RBPN hardware configuration service 427 uses the radio unit configuration data 457 ( Figure 4 )、antenna configuration data 460( Figure 4 ) and network function configuration data 463( Figure 4 ) to implement pre-configuration. Pre-configuration can include installing software, initializing software, configuring software to communicate with one or more services, setting frequency, setting modulation type, setting signal strength, setting directionality, and other types of pre-configuration. In block 724, RBPN management service 424 causes RBPN hardware deployment service 430 to ship the equipment including pre-configured pre-deployment device 409 to the customer. Various instructions for installing the equipment can be transmitted to the customer via client application 436.

[0133] In block 727, RBPN management service 424 may initiate reconfiguration of existing equipment and devices via RBPN hardware configuration service 427. For example, existing radio units and / or antennas may change frequency, signal strength, and / or other parameters. In addition, existing allocated computing capacity 421 for network function workload 466 may be reprogrammed or terminated to be replaced by other allocated computing capacity 421 to perform network functions. In some cases, the network function workload 466 may be configured to perform network functions via cloud provider network 203 ( Figure 2A ) to deploy or provision additional compute capacity.

[0134] In block 730, the RBPN management service 424 causes the modified RBPN 103 to be activated. The correct status of the modified radio-based private network 103 and the associated core network may be verified prior to activation. Thereafter, the operation of the portion of the RBPN management service 424 ends.

[0135] Next reference Figure 8, shows a flowchart of an example of the operation of providing a portion of capacity management service 433 according to various embodiments. It can be understood that Figure 8 The flowchart of is merely an example of many different types of functional arrangements that may be used to implement the operations of portions of the capacity management service 433 as described herein. Figure 8 The flowchart may be viewed as depicting a computing environment 403 ( Figure 4 ) is an example of an element of a method implemented in ).

[0136] Beginning at block 803, the capacity management service 433 monitors the RBPN 103 ( Figure 1A ) utilization, including each cell 109 ( Figure 1A ), utilization of devices and / or communication links. In block 806, the capacity management service 433 determines to release capacity of the RBPN 103. For example, the capacity may be released based at least in part on underutilization or in response to a request from a customer. The request from the customer may be received through a user interface or via an API call.

[0137] In some scenarios, capacity of RBPN 103 may be freed up (or transferred to other locations) to accommodate customer workloads 469 ( Figure 4 ) provisioning capacity. For example, a customer may have an application that is very latency sensitive and has a high priority for the customer, and the capacity management service 433 may determine that the best allocation would be to move the network function workload 466 ( Figure 4 ) to make room for applications executing at edge locations. After releasing capacity, capacity management service 433 can implement one or more actions to reclaim and reuse the capacity.

[0138] In box 809, the capacity management service 433 may determine to remove one or more cells 109 from the RBPN 103. For example, the capacity management service 433 may identify a particular cell 109 that is underutilized relative to a threshold or relatively underutilized compared to other cells 109 of the RBPN 103. In box 812, the capacity management service 433 may automatically disable the cell equipment (e.g., radio, antenna) or the capacity management service 433 may transfer the equipment for use by another customer. In some cases, the capacity management service 433 may request the customer to return the equipment to the provider and / or ship the equipment to another customer so that the equipment can be used by another customer. The capacity management service 433 may also automatically reduce bandwidth or reconfigure communication links to release bandwidth that was previously reserved for the RBPN 103 that is no longer needed.

[0139] In block 815, the capacity management service 433 may terminate one or more network function workloads 466 that are performing one or more network functions for the RBPN 103. Figure 4 Capacity management service 433 may determine allocated computing capacity 421 ( Figure 4 ) is no longer required given the utilization or performance of RBPN 103, or is a lower priority than customer workload 469.

[0140] In block 818, the capacity management service 433 initiates reallocation of the computing capacity previously occupied by the terminated network function workload 466. The computing capacity may be located at a computing device 418 ( Figure 4 In this regard, the capacity management service 433 may use the released capacity to launch a VM instance, container, or function to provide network functions to another customer or another RBPN 103.

[0141] Optionally, the capacity management service 433 may use the freed capacity to launch customer workloads 469 for applications other than network functions for the customer. For example, the capacity management service 433 may use the freed computing capacity to launch VM instances, containers, or functions for customer workloads 469. Such VM instances, containers, or functions may be independent of the functions of the RBPN 103. The VM instances, containers, or functions may be deployed on the provider underlying extension 224 ( Figure 2A ) so that computing capacity is not wasted or instead used for higher priority workloads.

[0142] In block 821, the capacity management service 433 may automatically reallocate the released spectrum to other customers or other cells 109 in the RBPN 103. The capacity management service 433 may also reallocate the network bandwidth that has been released.

[0143] In block 824, capacity management service 433 reduces charges to customers associated with RBPN 103 in view of the release of computing resources. In some cases, charges may remain the same or increase if a higher level of service is provided to the customer or a higher priority workload is executed in the reclaimed capacity. Thereafter, the operation of the portion of capacity management service 433 ends.

[0144] refer to Fig. 9, a schematic block diagram of a computing environment 403 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure is shown. The computing environment 403 includes one or more computing devices 900. Each computing device 900 includes at least one processor circuit, for example, having a processor 903 and a memory 906, both of which are coupled to a local interface 909. To this end, each computing device 900 may include, for example, at least one server computer or similar device. The local interface 909 may include, for example, a data bus with an accompanying address / control bus or other bus structure that can be understood.

[0145] Stored in the memory 906 are data and several components that can be executed by the processor 903. Specifically, stored in the memory 906 and executable by the processor 903 are RBPN management services 424, RBPN hardware configuration services 427, RBPN hardware deployment services 430, capacity management services 433 and possible other applications. Stored in the memory 906 can also be data storage areas 415 and other data. In addition, an operating system can be stored in the memory 906 and can be executed by the processor 903.

[0146] It should be understood that there may be other applications stored in the memory 906 and executable by the processor 903. Where any of the components discussed herein are implemented in software, any of a variety of programming languages ​​may be employed, such as C, C++, C#, Objective C, Perl, PHP, Visual Ruby, or other programming languages.

[0147] Many software components are stored in the memory 906 and can be executed by the processor 903. In this regard, the term "executable" refers to a program file in a form that can ultimately be run by the processor 903. Examples of executable programs can be, for example, compiled programs that can be translated into the following codes: machine code, whose format can be loaded into the random access portion of the memory 906 and run by the processor 903; source code, which can be expressed in an appropriate format, such as object code that can be loaded into the random access portion of the memory 906 and executed by the processor 903; or source code, which can be interpreted by another executable program to generate instructions to be executed by the processor 903 in the random access portion of the memory 906, etc. The executable program can be stored in any part or component of the memory 906, including, for example, random access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), hard drive, solid state drive, USB flash drive, memory card, optical disk such as compact disk (CD) or digital versatile disk (DVD), floppy disk, tape, or other storage component.

[0148] The memory 906 is defined herein as including volatile and non-volatile memory and data storage components. Volatile components are those components that do not retain data values ​​when the power is off. Non-volatile components are those components that retain data when the power is off. Therefore, the memory 906 may include, for example, random access memory (RAM), read-only memory (ROM), hard disk drive, solid state drive, USB flash drive, memory card accessed via a memory card reader, floppy disk accessed via an associated floppy disk drive, optical disk accessed via an optical drive, magnetic tape accessed via an appropriate tape drive, and / or other memory components, or any combination of two or more of these memory components. In addition, RAM may include, for example, static random access memory (SRAM), dynamic random access memory (DRAM) or magnetic random access memory (MRAM) and other such devices. ROM may include, for example, programmable read-only memory (PROM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM) or other similar storage devices.

[0149] In addition, the processor 903 may represent multiple processors 903 and / or multiple processor cores, and the memory 906 may represent multiple memories 906 operating in parallel processing circuits, respectively. In this case, the local interface 909 may be an appropriate network that facilitates communication between any two of the multiple processors 903, between any processor 903 and any memory 906, or between any two of the memories 906, etc. The local interface 909 may include additional systems designed to coordinate the communication, including, for example, performing load balancing. The processor 903 may be electrical or some other usable configuration.

[0150] Although RBPN management service 424, RBPN hardware configuration service 427, RBPN hardware deployment service 430, capacity management service 433 and other various systems described herein may be embodied in software or code executed by general hardware as described above, they may alternatively be embodied in dedicated hardware or a combination of software / general hardware and dedicated hardware. If embodied in dedicated hardware, each may be implemented as a circuit or state machine using any one or combination of a variety of technologies. These technologies may include, but are not limited to, discrete logic circuits with logic gates for implementing various logic functions when one or more data signals are applied, application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) with appropriate logic gates, field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), or other components, etc. Such technologies are generally well known to those skilled in the art and are therefore not described in detail herein.

[0151] Figures 5 to 8The flowchart illustrates the functionality and operation of an implementation of portions of the RBPN management service 424 and the capacity management service 433. If embodied in software, each block may represent a module, segment, or portion of code that includes program instructions for implementing a specified logical function. The program instructions may be embodied in the form of source code that includes human-readable statements written in a programming language, or machine code that includes digital instructions recognizable by a suitable execution system such as a processor 903 in a computer system or other system. The machine code may be converted from source code, etc. If embodied in hardware, each block may represent a circuit or multiple interconnected circuits to implement a specified logical function.

[0152] although Figures 5 to 8 The flowchart of the embodiment shows a specific execution order, but it is understood that the execution order may be different from the order depicted. For example, the execution order of two or more blocks may be disrupted relative to the order shown. In addition, Figures 5 to 8 Two or more blocks shown in succession in the above may be executed simultaneously or partially simultaneously. In addition, in some embodiments, Figures 5 to 8 One or more of the blocks shown may be skipped or omitted. In addition, any number of counters, state variables, warning semaphores or messages may be added to the logic flow described herein for purposes such as enhanced utility, billing, performance measurement or providing troubleshooting assistance. It is understood that all such variations are within the scope of the present disclosure.

[0153] In addition, any logic or application including software or code described herein (including RBPN Management Service 424, RBPN Hardware Configuration Service 427, RBPN Hardware Deployment Service 430, and Capacity Management Service 433) can be contained in any non-transitory computer-readable medium for use by or in conjunction with an instruction execution system, such as, for example, processor 903 in a computer system or other system. In this sense, logic can include, for example, statements including instructions and declarations that can be extracted from a computer-readable medium and executed by an instruction execution system. In the context of the present disclosure, a "computer-readable medium" can be any medium that can contain, store, or maintain the logic or application described herein for use by or in conjunction with an instruction execution system.

[0154] Computer readable media may include any of a number of physical media, such as, for example, magnetic, optical, or semiconductor media. More specific examples of suitable computer readable media would include, but are not limited to, magnetic tape, magnetic floppy disk, magnetic hard drive, memory card, solid state drive, USB flash drive, or optical disk. In addition, the computer readable medium may be a random access memory (RAM), including, for example, a static random access memory (SRAM) and a dynamic random access memory (DRAM), or a magnetic random access memory (MRAM). In addition, the computer readable medium may be a read-only memory (ROM), a programmable read-only memory (PROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), an electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), or other types of storage devices.

[0155] In addition, any logic or application described herein, including RBPN management service 424, RBPN hardware configuration service 427, RBPN hardware deployment service 430 and capacity management service 433, can be implemented and constructed in a variety of ways. For example, one or more applications described can be implemented as a module or component of a single application. In addition, one or more applications described herein can be executed in a shared or separate computing device or a combination thereof. For example, multiple applications described herein can be executed in the same computing device 900, or in multiple computing devices 900 in the same computing environment 403.

[0156] Unless otherwise specifically stated, disjunctive language such as the phrase "at least one of X, Y, or Z" should be understood in context as being generally used to present an item, term, etc. that can be X, Y, or Z, or any combination thereof (e.g., X, Y, and / or Z). Thus, such disjunctive language is generally not intended to, and should not, imply that certain embodiments require the presence of at least one of X, at least one of Y, or at least one of Z, respectively.

[0157] Embodiments of the present disclosure may be described at least in terms of:

[0158] Clause 1. A system comprising: at least one computing device in a cloud provider network; and instructions capable of being executed in the at least one computing device, wherein when executed, the instructions cause the at least one computing device to at least: receive a request from an organization to provision a radio-based private network to cover one or more buildings of the organization, the radio-based private network comprising a radio access network and an associated core network; determine an arrangement of multiple cells to cover the one or more buildings; automatically identify spectrum for the multiple cells via a spectrum reservation service; cause the cell equipment to be preconfigured to implement the multiple cells before shipping the cell equipment to the organization; and provision at least a portion of the associated core network for the organization in the cloud provider network.

[0159] Clause 2. A system according to clause 1, wherein when executed, the instructions further cause the at least one computing device to at least automatically detect an existing private network of the organization to determine at least one requirement for the radio-based private network or the associated core network.

[0160] Clause 3. A system according to clauses 1 to 2, wherein when executed, the instructions also cause the at least one computing device to scale at least the amount of resources allocated to the associated core network in the cloud provider network based at least in part on at least one of a utilization metric or a latency metric.

[0161] Clause 4. The system of clauses 1 to 3, wherein the instructions, when executed, further cause the at least one computing device to implement differentiated quality of service levels in at least the radio-based private network.

[0162] Clause 5. A cellular network comprising: at least one cell that provides radio-based private network coverage for at least one site of an organization; and at least one computing device in a cloud provider network that implements at least one network function for a core network associated with the radio-based private network.

[0163] Clause 6. A cellular network as described in Clause 5, wherein the radio-based dedicated network provides a first quality of service level for a first application of the organization and provides a second quality of service level for a second application of the organization.

[0164] Clause 7. A cellular network according to clauses 5 to 6, further comprising at least one other computing device in a cloud provider underlying extension of the cloud provider network located on the premises of the organization, the at least one other computing device implementing the at least one network function.

[0165] Clause 8. A cellular network according to Clause 7, which also includes instructions capable of being executed in the at least one computing device, which, when executed, causes the at least one computing device to at least: receive a request from the organization to transfer the at least one network function from the at least one computing device to the at least another computing device; and in response to the request, cause the at least one network function to be transferred from the at least one computing device to the at least another computing device.

[0166] Clause 9. A cellular network as described in clauses 5 to 8, wherein at least one radio unit and at least one antenna implementing the at least one cell are operated by a cloud service provider that also operates the cloud provider network.

[0167] Clause 10. The cellular network of clauses 5 to 9, wherein usage metrics corresponding to usage of the radio-based private network are tracked for the organization by a cloud service provider.

[0168] Clause 11. A cellular network according to clauses 5 to 10, which also includes a radio-based dedicated network management service capable of being executed in the at least one computing device, wherein when executed, the radio-based dedicated network management service causes the at least one computing device to at least: monitor at least one of the utilization or latency of the radio-based dedicated network; and in response to determining that at least one of the utilization or the latency meets a threshold standard, pre-configure the device to implement additional cells for the radio-based dedicated network before shipping the device to the organization.

[0169] Clause 12. The cellular network of Clause 11, wherein when executed, the dedicated radio-based network management service further causes the at least one computing device to at least automatically identify additional spectrum for the additional cell.

[0170] Clause 13. A cellular network according to clauses 11 to 12, wherein when executed, the radio-based dedicated network management service also causes the at least one computing device to at least automatically allocate additional computing capacity in the at least one computing device for the at least one network function.

[0171] Clause 14. A method comprising: receiving, by at least one computing device, a request from an organization for a provider to provision a radio-based private network and an associated core network to cover a site of the organization; determining an arrangement of one or more cells to cover the site; causing, by the at least one computing device, the cell equipment to be preconfigured to implement the one or more cells before shipping the cell equipment to the organization; and provisioning, by the at least one computing device, at least a portion of the associated core network for the organization in a cloud provider network.

[0172] Clause 15. The method according to clause 14 further includes: determining, by the at least one computing device, to add an additional cell to the radio-based dedicated network; and causing, by the at least one computing device, the additional cell device to be preconfigured to implement the additional cell before shipping the additional cell device to the organization.

[0173] Clause 16. The method of clauses 14 to 15, further comprising scaling, by the at least one computing device, a quantity of computing resources allocated to one or more network functions of the associated core network in the cloud provider network.

[0174] Clause 17. The method of clauses 14 to 16, further comprising reserving, by the at least one computing device, spectrum for the one or more cells via a spectrum reservation service.

[0175] Clause 18. The method of clauses 14 to 17, further comprising probing, by the at least one computing device, an existing private network of the organization to determine at least one requirement for the radio-based private network.

[0176] Clause 19. The method according to clauses 14 to 18 further includes: implementing a first quality of service level for a first device type on the radio-based dedicated network by the at least one computing device; and implementing a second quality of service level for a second device type on the radio-based dedicated network by the at least one computing device.

[0177] Clause 20. The method of clauses 14 to 19, wherein the associated core network is provisioned in the cloud provider network.

[0178] It should be emphasized that the above-mentioned embodiments of the present disclosure are merely possible implementation examples set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the present disclosure. Many changes and modifications may be made to the above-mentioned embodiments without substantially departing from the spirit and principles of the present disclosure. In this article, all such modifications and changes are intended to be included within the scope of the present disclosure and are protected by the appended claims.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising: receiving a request from an organization for a provider to provision a radio-based private network and an associated core network to cover a site of the organization; probing an existing private network of the organization to determine at least one requirement for the radio-based private network; determining an arrangement of one or more cells to cover the site; causing the cell equipment to be preconfigured to implement the one or more cells and to satisfy the at least one requirement for the radio-based private network prior to shipping the cell equipment to the organization; and The associated core network is provisioned for the organization.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the cell device comprises a computer server. 3 . The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the associated core network is provisioned at the organization's premises. 4 . The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the associated core network is provisioned in a provider underlay extension of a cloud provider network.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising: determining to add an additional cell to the radio-based private network; as well as Prior to shipping an additional cell device to the organization, the additional cell device is caused to be preconfigured to implement the additional cell.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising: Spectrum is reserved for the one or more cells via a spectrum reservation service.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising: implementing a first quality of service level for a first device type over the radio-based dedicated network; as well as A second quality of service level is implemented for a second device type over the dedicated radio-based network.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the at least one requirement for the dedicated radio-based network comprises an initial threshold value for at least one performance metric of the dedicated radio-based network.

9. A system comprising: At least one computing device configured to at least: receiving a request from an organization for a provider to provision a radio-based private network and an associated core network to cover a site of the organization; probing an existing private network of the organization to determine at least one requirement for the radio-based private network or an associated core network; causing the cell equipment to be preconfigured to implement one or more cells and to satisfy the at least one requirement for the radio-based private network prior to shipping the cell equipment to the organization; and The associated core network is provisioned for the organization.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to determine a placement of the one or more cells to cover the site.

11. The system of claim 9, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to scale an amount of resources allocated to the associated core network based at least in part on one of: a utilization metric or a latency metric.

12. The system of claim 9, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to implement differentiated quality of service levels in at least the radio-based private network.

13. The system of claim 9, wherein the at least one requirement for the radio-based private network comprises an initial threshold value for at least one performance metric of the radio-based private network.

14. A system comprising: At least one computing device configured to at least: receiving a request from an organization for a provider to provision a radio-based private network to cover a site of the organization; probing an existing private network of the organization to determine at least one requirement for the radio-based private network; causing the device to be preconfigured to implement the radio-based private network and to satisfy the at least one requirement for the radio-based private network prior to shipping the device to the organization; and Provision a core network for the organization.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to reserve spectrum allocation for the radio-based private network using at least a spectrum reservation service.

16. The system of claim 14, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to at least determine a placement of the devices for covering the site.

17. The system of claim 14, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to provision one or more network slices on at least the radio-based dedicated network to provide differentiated quality of service.

18. The system of claim 14, wherein at least a portion of the core network is provisioned in a cloud provider network.

19. The system of claim 14, wherein at least a portion of the core network is provisioned in a server at the organization's premises.

20. The system of claim 14, wherein the device comprises a computer server.

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