An Analytic Hierarchy Process Algorithm for Cloud Based Wi-Fi Offloading

The rapid growth of mobile Internet services has triggered the explosion of Internet data traffic going through mobile networks. This brings a big challenge to mobile operators because their existing networks and deployment plan on mobile networks can hardly meet the demand. To solve this problem, alternative solutions are needed while Wi-Fi offloading is regarded as one primary candidate. By Wi-Fi offloading mobile traffic can be diverted through Wi-Fi networks. Thus, selecting an optimal access point is becoming crucial for the performance of mobile connection and user experience. In this paper, we propose an algorithm based on Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) to select an optimal mobile access point. We investigate the impact of the judgment matrix and performance parameters on the selection decision. Our experimental study shows that the algorithm can improve the access point selection and user experience.