The increasing mobile data demand in current cellular networks and the proliferation of advanced handheld devices place user-provided networks (UPNs) in a prominent position for next-generation network architectures. In UPN, users share their connectivity and provide Internet connection for others without additional network infrastructure cost. However, the success of such network heavily depends on users’ willingness to contribute their resources. Motivated by the recently launched traded data plans, where wireless service providers allow users to sell and buy leftover data capacities from each other, we incorporate the concept of data plan trading into UPN as an incentive for users to participate in this network. This talk provides an overview on the business models recently implemented by different operators together with our contribution to this field, in terms of novel strategies for buyer and seller association for data trading, pricing data trading, and pricing mechanism for the users to join the UPN.
Beatriz Lorenzo received the Ph.D. degree from University of Oulu, Finland, in 2012 and M.Sc degree in Telecommunication Engineering from University of Vigo, Spain, in 2008. From 2008 to 2014 she worked at the Centre for Wireless Communications (CWC) at University of Oulu, Finland as researcher and project manager within several academic and industry supported projects. During the same period, she was also teacher of master level courses in the area of wireless networks at the Dept. Communications Engineering, University of Oulu. In June 2014, she joint Atlantic Research Center for Information and Communication Technologies (AtlantTIC) at the University of Vigo where she currently works as senior researcher. She has received 7 awards for her research and recently granted Juan de la Cierva Fellowship. She has published about 30 papers in international journals and conferences, and 1 voluminous book on 4G networks. Her research interests are in the area of multihop cellular networks, heterogeneous networks, network economics, network optimization, topology control, opportunistic communications, bio-inspired networks and complex networks.