Toward Traffic Offload in Converged Satellite and Terrestrial Networks

Whilst broadband Internet connectivity has become highly important, providing broadband connectivity nonetheless remains a considerable challenge, particularly in rural and remote regions where the deployment of optical fibers faces economical obstacles. A promising option to address this issue is that of the most recent satellite systems, capable of providing high capacities virtually everywhere. However, compared to most terrestrial systems, satellite networks have very different link and, more importantly, latency characteristics, which often render them only barely usable for delay intolerant traffic. Thus, convergence of terrestrial and satellite networks is required, so that only certain traffic flows can be offloaded onto a supplemental satellite connection. In this paper, we propose a network architecture relying on modern software defined network concepts, which enable dynamic traffic offloading in a converged satellite and terrestrial network, in order to relieve the load in a narrow-band terrestrial network. We show that with limited overhead, a traffic can be offloaded, leading to an increase in the user's quality-of-experience.