Introduction

It would be possible to write a book about Weightless without much discussion about the network. This is partly because the network is not included within the specification and partly because the network is relatively simple.

The Weightless specification covers the interface from the base station into the network. However, unlike cellular networks there are no defined interfaces within the network. This is because it is envisaged that all the network functions can be run on a virtual machine within the cloud. The interface from this machine to the base stations is well defined. The interface from this machine to the client networks will likely be bespoke for each client network and therefore not appropriate for specification. Hence, there are no further interfaces to standardise.

It might seem rather incredible that the core network of a cellular system consisting of many large and expensive computing platforms can be collapsed into a single virtual machine within Weightless when a machine network is likely to have many more subscribers than a cellular network and further much of the intelligence typically found in a base station in a cellular network has been transferred to the core.