Blocking, hand-off and traffic performance for cellular communication systems with mixed platforms

Cellular communication systems that support a mixture of platform types distinguished by different mobility characteristics are considered. A tractable analytical model for traffic performance analysis is developed using multidimensional birth–death processes and the method of phases. The framework allows consideration of homogeneous and nonhomogeneous systems, a broad class of dwell time distributions, and ‘missed’ hand-off initiations. Cut-off priority for hand-offs and several platform types are considered to demonstrate the approach. The effects of different mobility parameters and of imperfect detection of hand-off needs are examined. Theoretical performance characteristics are obtained. These exhibit carried traffic, hand-off activity, blocking probability and forced termination probability for each platform type. The realisable exchange of blocking for hand-off performance is shown. Computational issues are discussed and a method for extrapolating performance characteristics for systems with many channels is presented.