5G-Crosshaul: Towards a Unified Data-Plane for 5G Transport Networks

The increasing stress on mobile radio access performance in a context of declining revenues for operators is requiring the evolution of transport networks (backhaul and fronthaul), which currently work decoupled. The heterogeneity of the nodes and transmission technologies inter-connecting the fronthaul and backhaul segments makes the network quite complex, costly and inefficient to manage flexibly and dynamically. In order to meet 5G requirements in a cost-effective manner, 5G-Crosshaul is designing a 5G transport network that unifies the data, control, and management planes . O n the one hand, this paper includes an overview, from a data-plane perspective, of the unified network architecture proposed by 5GCrosshaul project, discussing the different enabling transport and multiplexing technologies. O n the other hand, it also presents one of the main concepts of this project, a novel multi -layer switch architecture that enables the multiplexing of fronthaul and backhaul traffic within the same transport network. 1 Keywords—5G architecture, fronthaul, backhaul, transport network, switch architecture