Patent ID: 9681334
Date: 2017-06-13
CPC Classifications: H04W

Claim:
1. A method of enabling load steering between a 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Radio Access Network (RAN) and a Wi-Fi RAN, the method comprising, at a server: generating overlap information associating one or more cells of the 3GPP RAN with one or more Access Points (APs) of the Wi-Fi RAN, wherein a cell of the 3GPP RAN is associated with an AP of the Wi-Fi RAN if it is determined that the cell overlaps with an area covered by the AP of the Wi-Fi RAN; determining an off-load schedule for the cell of the 3GPP RAN, the off-load schedule indicating when an overlapping AP of the Wi-Fi RAN can reject an attempt by a user terminal to attach to the overlapping AP of the Wi-Fi RAN; and sending the off-load schedule to the Wi-Fi RAN, wherein the generating overlap information associating the one or more cells of the 3GPP RAN with the one or more APs of the Wi-Fi RAN comprises: identifying when the user terminal is active in both the cell of the 3GPP RAN and the area covered by the AP of the Wi-Fi RAN, wherein the identifying when the user terminal is active comprises: