Efficient allocation of disaggregated RAN functions and Multi-access Edge Computing services

Openness, virtualization and disaggregation of functions represent the state-of-the-art (SOTA) for optimal management and orchestration of Radio Access Network (RAN) resources. However, in 5G and beyond networks, virtualized RAN (vRAN) functions may commonly share computing resources with Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC) services. This paper introduces a new problem formulation that jointly optimizes vRAN functions and MEC services respecting the maximum acceptable delay of the applications. We show that our model achieves better solutions than a SOTA approach and it is also more flexible. We also present a heuristic solution that is able to achieve near optimal results for real-world networks.