Traditionally, the radio access network (RAN) has been the solution for network operators and was referred to as the “dumb pipe” for data and voice calls.
With the revolution of the 5G Network, the operators are now able to convert these dumb pipes into ‘intelligent’ ones. By overlaying distributed edge cloud computation onto the RAN the intelligent pipes are being established and are moving on an upward spiral.
Therefore our most important question is asked that “What exactly is Mobile Edge Computing(MEC)?”
What is Mobile- Edge Computing?
Mobile- Edge Computing is also known as Multi-Access Edge Computing and is an ETSI-defined network architecture that empowers the capabilities of cloud computing and an IT service environment at the edge of the cellular network.
It is used to enable elastic, flexible, and rapid deployment of new applications and services for every customer.
But don’t you know why is it referred to as Multi-Access Edge Computing and if these two differ from each other?
MEC computing refers to the computing at the edge of a network. This edge is analogous to a distributed cloud with closeness to the end-user delivering ultra-low latency, scalability, and reliability. When visualized for the first time, the edge of a network was the edge of a mobile network. Therefore the name mobile edge computing came into place. Technological experts later realized that the term MCE leaves out several access points that also construct the edge of a network. Therefore, they modified the name mobile edge computing to multi-access computing in order to reflect that the edge is not solely based on mobile networks.
MEC Architecture
The Mobile-Edge Computing architecture is composed of three main elements which are:
- Mobile-Edge Hosting Infrastructure Management System
- Mobile-Edge Platform Management System
- Application Management System
Mobile-Edge Hosting Infrastructure Management System
The Mobile edge hosting infrastructure is a management system consisting of the virtualization infrastructure that provides compute, storage, and network resources for the mobile edge applications. It provides persistent storage and includes a data plane that executes the rules received by the mobile edge platform, routing the traffic between the applications, services, and networks.
Mobile-EdgePlatform Management System
The Mobile edge platform (ME platform) represents a collection of baseline functionalities that are required to run applications on a particular ME host and enable mobile edge applications to discover, advertise offer and consume the ME services.
They are needed to steer the traffic between the applications, services, and networks resulting in traffic control, radio access network (RAN) information services, communication services, and service registry.
Application Management System
These are the virtualized machines running on top of the virtualization infrastructure provided by the ME host. The applications interact with the ME platform over a reference point to consume the services offered by the platform. Applications can also offer to propose services to
the platform which can further provide the same service to other applications.
How MEC and 5G are changing the entire industry?
A next-generation network isn’t just about speed. It’s about reimagining what’s possible!
The 5G Edge is a mobile edge computing platform that enables developers to build applications for wireless edge devices with lower latency and reduce network congestion.
MEC uses RAN information like cell load, user location, and allocated bandwidth to improve the network by services of optimization of mobile resources, pre-processing and aggregation of large data before sending to cloud, and context-aware services.
With the enormous growth in Smart devices and IoT, the Internet traffic volume has grown exponentially due to the advent of many new applications. Examining such flooding traffic requires extensive compute and bandwidth, raising privacy concerns. Therefore, the Mobile-Edge platforms ease the load by bringing resources to the proximity of data.
Manufacturing
One of the most booming and growing applications in the use cases of edge computing is the industrial manufacturing sector.
It enables the industrial equipment to make autonomous decisions without human intervention. The Sensor can monitor the condition of machinery and optimize usage according to speeding up or slowing down operations. Smart factories equipped with temperature, motion, and climate sensors can adjust cooling, lighting, and other environmental controls to make the most efficient use of power. This is just one of the advantages of edge computing that is utilizing industrial IoT devices.
Transportation
Businesses are taking the advantage of 24/7 autonomous fleets. With high bandwidth and low latency of 5G, the MCE will process the driving information in near real-time. It puts the network on the train. With two edge servers in each carriage, you can form a ‘wireless daisy chain’ network that serves you coverage inside the carriage linked to the next carriage and the next, thereby furnishing a standalone wireless network that runs the entire length of the train.
Automobile Industry
A surge of connected vehicles has flooded the automobile industry over the last few years. Every new vehicle will be connected and generate high-volume data that can be transferred to/from the cloud.
Mobile Edge Computing can broaden these connected car clouds into a mobile base station, allowing data to be stored and processed swiftly. The biggest demand will be to efficiently process & deliver this data for achieving speed, reliability, and security.
It can also allow drivers to receive warnings from other vehicles in real-time.
Conclusion
Mobile Edge Computing can help the operators expand both bandwidth and coverage. Using this virtualized platform one can have an unparalleled quality of experience with efficient utilization of the Radio and the network resources.
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Our 5G test Equipment supports carrier bandwidth up to 100MHz and frequency ranges from 70MHz to 6GHz for both FDD and TDD.
Enriched with our 5G Network Emulator, we can validate your devices to work on networks across any region in the world.
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