Performance analysis of the WLAN-first scheme in cellular/WLAN interworking

In the interworking between a cellular network and wireless local area networks (WLANs), a two-tier overlaying structure exists in the WLAN-covered areas. Due to the heterogeneous underlying quality-of-service (QoS) support, the admission of traffic in these areas has a significant impact on QoS satisfaction and overall resource utilization, especially when multiple services are considered. In this paper, we analyze the performance of a simple admission strategy, referred to as WLAN-first scheme, in which incoming voice and data service requests always first try to get admission to the WLAN whenever it is available. It is observed that the overall resource utilization can be maximized when the admission regions for voice and data services in a cell and a WLAN are properly configured.