Energy efficient multicast data delivery using cooperative mobile clouds

Data reception over cellular and similar architectures is extremely power hungry, resulting in quick battery drain. In order to improve the quality of experience, the energy consumption has to be reduced. A mobile cloud, formed using cellular and short-range platforms of the mobiles is considered. It is shown that when all users of the cloud are accessing the same data, the mobile cloud can provide significant energy savings. Several practical strategies are developed for cooperation in a mobile cloud. The energy per bit of the strategies is analyzed using timeline diagrams and the average energy gains in a time varying data rate scenario are studied. The results provide useful insights into the possible operation of the strategies and shows that significant energy reductions are possible.