Contract-based content delivery in 5G converged networks

Mobile broadcasting services provided by converged networks do aid in satisfying users’ demands for popular multimedia content while unicasting services offer personalized experiences for users. We analyze hybrid broadcasting unicasting framework from the perspective of network economics, where content provider(CP) figures out the cooperation of broadcasting and unicasting services providers, as long as their pricing strategies. To this end, a contract-based content delivery scheme is proposed. The profit of CP depends on users’ preference and satisfaction for unicasting and broadcasting transmission. CP provides different users with distinctive data packages. The intent is to maximize its own profit. By classifying users into different types, the optimal contract in close form is derived. Numerical results show that the proposed optimal contract is able to generate incentive for users to employ broadcasting transmission, which further benefits both the CP and users.