Mobile Hotspot TAU Offloading for Client Power Savings
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Solution Overview
Problem
Client devices with WWAN capability face challenges in managing power consumption during Tracking Area Updates (TAU) procedures, as they typically need to maintain active connections for both internet services and voice/video calls, leading to increased power usage.
Innovation Solution
A mobile Hotspot device is enabled to perform TAU procedures on behalf of client devices connected over a Short Range Wireless Link (SRWL), allowing the client devices to keep their WWAN modems in low power mode by controlling the transmission of modem capabilities and status information, determining if the mobile Hotspot can perform the TAU, and accepting or rejecting the offer to perform the procedure.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If client devices maintain active WWAN connections for both internet services and voice/video calls, then service availability is improved, but power consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The mobile hotspot acts as an intermediary between the WWAN network and client devices. It maintains the active WWAN connection and performs TAU procedures on behalf of client devices, allowing them to remain connected to the hotspot via SRWL without maintaining active WWAN connections themselves. This mediator approach resolves the contradiction by centralizing power-consuming operations in one device while enabling multiple devices to benefit from reduced power consumption.
Solution Approach 2:
The mobile hotspot performs self-service by autonomously handling TAU procedures and network registration for itself and its connected client devices. By implementing this self-service mechanism, the hotspot eliminates the need for client devices to independently perform power-consuming network procedures, thereby reducing their power consumption while maintaining service availability.
2Reliability
If client devices perform TAU procedures independently, then network registration reliability is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The mobile hotspot serves as an intermediary that centralizes the complex TAU procedure logic and network registration management. Client devices simply connect to the hotspot via SRWL without needing to understand or implement complex TAU procedures. The hotspot handles all network registration complexities independently, thereby improving reliability through centralized management while reducing device complexity for client devices.
3Use of energy by moving object
If mobile hotspot performs TAU procedures for multiple client devices, then power consumption of client devices is reduced, but network signaling overhead increases
Solution Approach 1:
The mobile hotspot merges multiple client device TAU requirements into a single unified TAU procedure. Instead of each client device performing separate TAU procedures with the WWAN network, the hotspot consolidates these requests and performs one TAU procedure that serves all connected client devices. This merging approach reduces the total number of signaling messages exchanged with the network, thereby reducing signaling overhead while enabling power savings for multiple devices simultaneously.
Data Source
AI summary
A mobile Hotspot is a device that includes a modem for wide area mobile broadband access and a Hotspot Access Point to distribute the internet to local client devices over a local area network such as Wi-Fi. Some of the local client devices may have mobile broadband capability of their own but may use the internet service from the mobile Hotspot when connected to it. In that case the client device may still need to maintain the communication link with the wide area mobile broadband network even when not actively using its services. A method and apparatus are disclosed that enable a mobile Hotspot to maintain the communication link with the wide area mobile broadband network on behalf of the client device. This may enable the client device with mobile broadband connection capability to reduce its power consumption.