Big Data for 5G Intelligent Network Slicing Management

Network slicing is a powerful tool to harness the full potential of 5G systems. It allows verticals to own and exploit independent logical networks on top of the same physical infrastructure. Motivated by the emergence of the big data paradigm, this article focuses on the enablers of big-databased intelligent network slicing. The article starts by revisiting the architecture of this technology that consists of data collection, storage, processing, and analytics before it highlights their relationship with network slicing concepts and the underlying trade-offs. It then proposes a complete framework for implementing big-data-driven dynamic slicing resource provisioning while respecting SLAs. This includes the development of low-complexity slices' traffic predictors, resource allocation models, and SLA enforcement via constrained deep learning. The article finally identifies the key challenges and open research directions in this emerging area.