Socially-optimal online spectrum auctions for secondary wireless communication

Spectrum auctions are efficient mechanisms for licensed users to relinquish their under-utilized spectrum to secondary links for monetary remuneration. Truthfulness and social welfare maximization are two natural goals in such auctions, but cannot be achieved simultaneously with polynomial-time complexity by existing methods, even in a static network with fixed parameters. The challenge escalates in practical systems with QoS requirements and volatile traffic demands for secondary communication. Online, dynamic decisions are required for rate control, channel evaluation/bidding, and packet dropping at each secondary link, as well as for winner determination and pricing at the primary user. This work proposes an online spectrum auction framework with cross-layer decision making and randomized winner determination on the fly. The framework is truthful-inexpectation, and achieves close-to-offline-optimal time-averaged social welfare and individual utilities with polynomial time complexity. A new method is introduced for online channel evaluation in a stochastic setting. Simulation studies further verify the efficacy of the proposed auction in practical scenarios.published_or_final_versio

POEM: Pricing Longer for Edge Computing in the Device Cloud

Multiple access mobile edge computing has been proposed as a promising technology to bring computation services close to end users, by making good use of edge cloud servers. In mobile device clouds (MDC), idle end devices may act as edge servers to offer computation services for busy end devices. Most existing auction based incentive mechanisms in MDC focus on only one round auction without considering the time correlation. Moreover, although existing single round auctions can also be used for multiple times, users should trade with higher bids to get more resources in the cascading rounds of auctions, then their budgets will run out too early to participate in the next auction, leading to auction failures and the whole benefit may suffer. In this paper, we formulate the computation offloading problem as a social welfare optimization problem with given budgets of mobile devices, and consider pricing longer of mobile devices. This problem is a multiple-choice multi-dimensional 0-1 knapsack problem, which is a NP-hard problem. We propose an auction framework named MAFL for long-term benefits that runs a single round resource auction in each round. Extensive simulation results show that the proposed auction mechanism outperforms the single round by about 55.6% on the revenue on average and MAFL outperforms existing double auction by about 68.6% in terms of the revenue.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure, Accepted by the 18th International Conference on Algorithms and Architectures for Parallel Processing (ICA3PP

Radio Spectrum and the Disruptive Clarity OF Ronald Coase.

In the Federal Communications Commission, Ronald Coase (1959) exposed deep foundations via normative argument buttressed by astute historical observation. The government controlled scarce frequencies, issuing sharply limited use rights. Spillovers were said to be otherwise endemic. Coase saw that Government limited conflicts by restricting uses; property owners perform an analogous function via the "price system." The government solution was inefficient unless the net benefits of the alternative property regime were lower. Coase augured that the price system would outperform the administrative allocation system. His spectrum auction proposal was mocked by communications policy experts, opposed by industry interests, and ridiculed by policy makers. Hence, it took until July 25, 1994 for FCC license sales to commence. Today, some 73 U.S. auctions have been held, 27,484 licenses sold, and $52.6 billion paid. The reform is a textbook example of economic policy success. We examine Coase‘s seminal 1959 paper on two levels. First, we note the importance of its analytical symmetry, comparing administrative to market mechanisms under the assumption of positive transaction costs. This fundamental insight has had enormous influence within the economics profession, yet is often lost in current analyses. This analytical insight had its beginning in his acclaimed early article on the firm (Coase 1937), and continued into his subsequent treatment of social cost (Coase 1960). Second, we investigate why spectrum policies have stopped well short of the property rights regime that Coase advocated, considering rent-seeking dynamics and the emergence of new theories challenging Coase‘s property framework. One conclusion is easily rendered: competitive bidding is now the default tool in wireless license awards. By rule of thumb, about$17 billion in U.S. welfare losses have been averted. Not bad for the first 50 years of this, or any, Article appearing in Volume II of the Journal of Law & Economics.

The Case for Liberal Spectrum Licenses: A Technical and Economic Perspective

The traditional system of radio spectrum allocation has inefficiently restricted wireless services. Alternatively, liberal licenses ceding de facto spectrum ownership rights yield incentives for operators to maximize airwave value. These authorizations have been widely used for mobile services in the U.S. and internationally, leading to the development of highly productive services and waves of innovation in technology, applications and business models. Serious challenges to the efficacy of such a spectrum regime have arisen, however. Seeing the widespread adoption of such devices as cordless phones and wi-fi radios using bands set aside for unlicensed use, some scholars and policy makers posit that spectrum sharing technologies have become cheap and easy to deploy, mitigating airwave scarcity and, therefore, the utility of exclusive rights. This paper evaluates such claims technically and economically. We demonstrate that spectrum scarcity is alive and well. Costly conflicts over airwave use not only continue, but have intensified with scientific advances that dramatically improve the functionality of wireless devices and so increase demand for spectrum access. Exclusive ownership rights help direct spectrum inputs to where they deliver the highest social gains, making exclusive property rules relatively more socially valuable. Liberal licenses efficiently accommodate rival business models (including those commonly associated with unlicensed spectrum allocations) while mitigating the constraints levied on spectrum use by regulators imposing restrictions in traditional licenses or via use rules and technology standards in unlicensed spectrum allocations.

Spectrum Auction Framework for Access Allocation in Cognitive Radio Networks

In cognitive radio networks, there are two categories of networks on different channels: primary networks, which have high-priority access, and secondary networks, which have low-priority access. We develop an auction-based framework that allows networks to bid for primary and secondary access based on their utilities and traffic demands. The bids are used to solve the access allocation problem, which is that of selecting the primary and secondary networks on each channel either to maximize the auctioneer’s revenue or to maximize the social welfare of the bidding networks, while enforcing incentive compatibility. We first consider the case when the bids of a network depend on which other networks it will share channels with. When there is only one secondary network on each channel, we design an optimal polynomial- time algorithm for the access allocation problem based on reduction to a maximum matching problem in weighted graphs. When there can be two or more secondary networks on a channel, we show that the optimal access allocation problem is NP-complete. Next, we consider the case when the bids of a network are independent of which other networks it will share channels with. We design a polynomial-time dynamic programming algorithm to optimally solve the access allocation problem when the number of possible cardinalities of the set of secondary networks on a channel is upper-bounded. Finally, we design a polynomial-time algorithm that approximates the access allocation problem within a factor of 2 when the above upper bound does not exist

Game theory for dynamic spectrum sharing cognitive radio

This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University on 21 June 2010.‘Game Theory’ is the formal study of conflict and cooperation. The theory is based on a set of tools that have been developed in order to assist with the modelling and analysis of individual, independent decision makers. These actions potentially affect any decisions, which are made by other competitors. Therefore, it is well suited and capable of addressing the various issues linked to wireless communications. This work presents a Green Game-Based Hybrid Vertical Handover Model. The model is used for heterogeneous wireless networks, which combines both dynamic (Received Signal Strength and Node Mobility) and static (Cost, Power Consumption and Bandwidth) factors. These factors control the handover decision process; whereby the mechanism successfully eliminates any unnecessary handovers, reduces delay and overall number of handovers to 50% less and 70% less dropped packets and saves 50% more energy in comparison to other mechanisms. A novel Game-Based Multi-Interface Fast-Handover MIPv6 protocol is introduced in this thesis as an extension to the Multi-Interface Fast-handover MIPv6 protocol. The protocol works when the mobile node has more than one wireless interface. The protocol controls the handover decision process by deciding whether a handover is necessary and helps the node to choose the right access point at the right time. In addition, the protocol switches the mobile nodes interfaces ‘ON’ and ‘OFF’ when needed to control the mobile node’s energy consumption and eliminate power lost of adding another interface. The protocol successfully reduces the number of handovers to 70%, 90% less dropped packets, 40% more received packets and acknowledgments and 85% less end-to-end delay in comparison to other Protocols. Furthermore, the thesis adapts a novel combination of both game and auction theory in dynamic resource allocation and price-power-based routing in wireless Ad-Hoc networks. Under auction schemes, destinations nodes bid the information data to access to the data stored in the server node. The server will allocate the data to the winner who values it most. Once the data has been allocated to the winner, another mechanism for dynamic routing is adopted. The routing mechanism is based on the source-destination cooperation, power consumption and source-compensation to the intermediate nodes. The mechanism dramatically increases the seller’s revenue to 50% more when compared to random allocation scheme and briefly evaluates the reliability of predefined route with respect to data prices, source and destination cooperation for different network settings. Last but not least, this thesis adjusts an adaptive competitive second-price pay-to-bid sealed auction game and a reputation-based game. This solves the fairness problems associated with spectrum sharing amongst one primary user and a large number of secondary users in a cognitive radio environment. The proposed games create a competition between the bidders and offers better revenue to the players in terms of fairness to more than 60% in certain scenarios. The proposed game could reach the maximum total profit for both primary and secondary users with better fairness; this is illustrated through numerical results

Regulación y estrategias para la transformación digital eficiencia en la expansión de redes y en la provisión de bienes y servicios digitales

Tesis de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas y Empresariales, leída el 06/11/2017The digital transformation taking place in the last decades is a revolution with a deep economic, social, and cultural impact. It has created enormous opportunities and also new risks. Growth, enhanced productivity, increased citizenship engagement, better democracy and social inclusion are some of the opportunities but at the same time these transformations are challenging human and consumer rights, social policies and economic efficiency. Reaching the huge potential benefits of the digital revolution requires economic analysis to guide new regulations and policies accompanying technological advancement. This thesis proposes regulations and strategies for an optimal provision of digital networks, goods and services contributing to some of the topics of focus in recent literature on digital economy. One problem is entry barriers to companies selling internet access. We contribute to the literature by analyzing one of the causes of the existence of entry barriers, the problem of how efficiently allocate the radio-spectrum. Another problem is the optimal prices to remunerate network providers, digital service providers, consumers and vendors. We contribute by examining the impact of price discrimination of internet content providers under duopolistic competition and multi-dimensional product differentiation in retail broadband access in chapter 3. Chapter 1 offers some proposals for the evaluation of the efficient allocation of spectrum to radio communication services. New approaches to spectrum management have resulted in a more efficient production of services. However, the role of the public sector is still essential in spectrum allocation. This chapter provides a methodology to measure the net benefit of the reallocation of a spectrum band intended to guide regulators and policy makers. We have identified the following facts...La transformación digital que está teniendo lugar en las últimas décadas es una revolución con un profundo impacto económico, social y cultural que ha creado enormes oportunidades y también nuevos retos. Algunas de las oportunidades son un mayor crecimiento económico, mejoras de la productividad, mayor participación ciudadana y una mayor inclusión social, pero al mismo tiempo estas transformaciones desafían los derechos de los ciudadanos y de los consumidores, las políticas sociales y la eficiencia económica. Para alcanzar el enorme potencial de la revolución digital es necesario que el análisis económico guie la regulación y las políticas que acompañan al desarrollo tecnológico. Esta tesis propone nuevas normas y estrategias para una óptima provisión de redes, bienes y servicios digitales, contribuyendo en algunos de los temas de interés de la literatura reciente sobre economía digital. Un problema es la existencia de barreras a la entrada en el mercado de provisión de servicios de acceso a internet. Contribuimos a la literatura existente sobre este asunto, analizando en los capítulos 1 y 2, una de las causas de la existencia dichas barreras, la atribución ineficiente del espectro radioeléctrico. Otro problema es la formación de precios socialmente óptima para remunerar a los proveedores de acceso a internet, los proveedores de servicios digitales, los usuarios y los vendedores de publicidad. Contribuimos a esta materia examinando en el capítulo 3 el impacto de la discriminación de precios sobre proveedores de contenidos cuando en el mercado minorista de acceso a internet existe competencia imperfecta, duopolio, y diferenciación multidimensional de producto. El capítulo 1 ofrece propuestas para la evaluación de la eficiencia de una atribución de espectro a un servicio de radiocomunicaciones. Las nuevas técnicas de gestión del espectro han dado lugar a una provisión más eficiente de los servicios. Sin embargo, el papel del sector público sigue siendo necesario en la gestión del espectro. Este capítulo ofrece una metodología para medir el beneficio neto de una re-atribución de una banda de frecuencias para guiar a reguladores y diseñadores de políticas públicas. Se han obtenido los siguientes resultados destacables...Fac. de Ciencias Económicas y EmpresarialesTRUEunpu

ECONOMIC APPROACHES AND MARKET STRUCTURES FOR TEMPORAL-SPATIAL SPECTRUM SHARING

In wireless communication systems, economic approaches can be applied to spectrum sharing and enhance spectrum utilization. In this research, we develop a model where geographic information, including licensed areas of primary users (PUs) and locations of secondary users (SUs), plays an important role in the spectrum sharing system. We consider a multi-price policy and the pricing power of noncooperative PUs in multiple geographic areas. Meanwhile, the value assessment of a channel is price-related and the demand from the SUs is price-elastic. By applying an evolutionary procedure, we prove the existence and uniqueness of the optimal payoff for each PU selling channels without reserve. In the scenario of selling channels with reserve, we predict the channel prices for the PUs leading to the optimal supplies of the PUs and hence the optimal payoffs. To increase spectrum utilization, the scenario of spatial spectrum reuse is considered. We consider maximizing social welfare via on-demand channel allocation, which describes the overall satisfaction of the SUs when we involve the supply and demand relationship. We design a receiver-centric spectrum reuse mechanism, in which the optimal channel allocation that maximizes social welfare can be achieved by the Vickrey-Clarke-Groves (VCG) auction for maximal independent groups (MIGs). We prove that truthful bidding is the optimal strategy for the SUs, even though the SUs do not participate in the VCG auction for MIGs directly. Therefore, the MIGs are bidding truthfully and the requirement for social welfare maximization is satisfied. To further improve user satisfaction, user characteristics that enable heterogeneous channel valuations need to be considered in spatial spectrum reuse. We design a channel transaction mechanism for non-symmetric networks and maximize user satisfaction in consideration of multi-level flexible channel valuations of the SUs. Specifically, we introduce a constrained VCG auction. To facilitate the bid formation, we transform the constrained VCG auction to a step-by-step decision process. Meanwhile, the SUs in a coalition play a coalitional game with transferable utilities. We use the Shapley value to realize fair payoff distribution among the SUs in a coalition

Ireland, Broadcasting and the Spectrum Wars

This paper offers an overview and evaluation of Ireland’s changing media landscape through the prism of the recent policy contestation surrounding the future use of the UHF spectrum and it’s implications for the medium of television broadcasting. The article brings into focus current policy and governance developments and their interplay with market and technological change and how they are shaping a small open European state’s adaptation to the increasingly complex national/global hybrid media ecosystem. It examines the contexts surrounding the competition for spectrum resources and its implications for the role of free to air broadcasting and mobile broadband technologies in the future delivery of media and communication services. It takes a political economy and institutionalist perspective to evaluate the extent to which the evolution of the Irish institutional framework regarding broadcasting and broadband development and the allocation of spectrum frequencies is shaped by broader political economic and political/institutional dynamics and what this means for broadcasting within the evolving digital media ecology