RADIO COMMUNICATION DEVICE WITH ACCESS MEANS CONFORMING TO THE GAN AND 3GPP-WLAN INTERWORKING TECHNOLOGIES, AND CORRESPONDING ACCESS NETWORK CONTROLLER

Abstract

The invention concerns a radio communication device (700) comprising: for circuit-switched services, first access means, enabling access to a mobile network via a first access network included in a wireless local area network,for packet-switched services, second access means (70), enabling access to the mobile network via the first access network.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Other features and advantages of the invention will become more clearly apparent on reading the following description of a preferred embodiment, given by way of illustrative and nonlimiting example only, and from the appended drawings, in which:

FIGS. 1 to 5, already commented on in relation to the prior art, show:

FIG. 1: the architecture of a communication network conforming to the “GAN” technology;

FIG. 2: the architecture of a mobile station conforming to the “GAN” technology, for circuit-switched services;

FIG. 3: the architecture of the mobile station from FIG. 2, for packet-switched services;

FIG. 4: the architecture of a communication network conforming to the “I-WLAN” technology;

FIG. 5: the architecture of a mobile station conforming to the “I-WLAN” technology, for packet-switched services;

FIG. 6 shows the diagram of a radio communication device according to a preferred embodiment of the invention, for packet-switched services;

FIG. 7 shows the diagram of one particular embodiment of an access network controller according to the invention, for access to packet-switched services; and

FIG. 8 shows one example of a diagram of the exchange of messages between different entities of the network, in the case of access to the packet-switched services shown in FIG. 7.

Claims

1. Radio communication device (700) comprising: for circuit-switched services, first access means, enabling access to a mobile network via a first access network included in a wireless local area network, for packet-switched services, second access means (70), enabling access to said mobile network via said first access network, characterized in that said first access means conform to the “GAN” technology and said second access means conform to the “3GPP-WLAN Interworking” technology, said technologies being defined in the 3GPP standards.

2. Device (700) according to claim 1, characterized in that it further comprises: for said circuit-switched services, third access means, enabling access to said mobile network via a second access network included in said mobile network; andfor said packet-switched services, fourth access means (80), enabling access to said mobile network via said second access network included in said mobile network;and in that said third access means conform to the “GAN” technology and said fourth access means conform to the “3GPP-WLAN Interworking” technology.

3. Device (700) according to claim 2, characterized in that it further comprises, for said packet-switched services, distribution means (90) for assigning PDP streams (F1 to F4) to said second access means (70) or said fourth access means (80).

4. Device (700) according to claim 1, characterized in that said second access means (70) comprise control means (71) for: managing the establishment of an IPsec tunnel (T1 to T4) for each PDP stream (F1 to F4); andmatching each PDP stream with an IPsec tunnel.

5. Access network controller (900), enabling a radio communication device (700): for circuit-switched services, to access a mobile network via a first access network included in a wireless local area network,for packet-switched services, to access said mobile network via said first access network,characterized in that said access network controller (900) comprises:a unit GANC-CS (910) that corresponds to the part relating to the circuit-switched services of a controller GANC conforming to the “GAN” technology, for managing the streams for the circuit-switched services;a gateway TTG (920) conforming to the “3GPP-WLAN Interworking” technology, for managing streams for the packet-switched services, said technologies being defined in the 3GPP standards; anddistribution means (940) for assigning each stream to said unit GANC-CS or said gateway TTG.

6. Access network controller (900) according to claim 5, characterized in that it further comprises a single security gateway SEGW (930) placed on the upstream side of said unit GANC-CS (910) and said gateway TTG (920), on the same side as the radio communication device (700).

7. Access network controller (900) according to claim 6, characterized in that said security gateway SEGW (930) comprises said distribution means (940).