A Survey of Location Management Mechanisms and an Evaluation of their Applicability for 5G Cellular Networks

Location management is an important part in mobile cellular networks since the registered devices can change location while connected to the network. Location management has been of prime research interest over the past decades and several mechanisms have been proposed for legacy systems. However, these mechanisms have to be revisited in the scope of LTE and especially 5G networks where new usage scenarios emerge. In this paper we examine the suitability of existing solutions for 5G networks. Towards this goal we provide a summary of the existing proposals and also analyze a number of patents to verify what the industry believes as really feasible solutions. Then we pinpoint the problems to be expected in 5G networks, with respect to location management, and we propose a future proof path for the design of new location management schemes.