Co-Investment in Mobile Edge Computing with Infrastructure Update and Dynamic Participation
For network operators and service providers, this work addresses the cost-revenue imbalance hindering MEC deployment by enabling cooperative investment with dynamic participation.
The paper proposes a co-investment scheme for mobile edge computing where a network operator and multiple service providers jointly deploy and share infrastructure, using a coalitional game model with dynamic participation and resource updates. Numerical results show that this approach increases total payoff and strengthens the network operator's investment incentive.
Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) requires Network Operators (NOs) to undertake substantial infrastructure investments, while most revenues are captured by Service Providers (SPs) offering end-user applications. This cost-revenue imbalance discourages NOs from investing in MEC deployment, despite increasing demand for low-latency and bandwidth-intensive services. This paper proposes a co-investment scheme in which players, i.e., one NO and multiple SPs, jointly deploy, maintain, and share MEC infrastructure over multiple decision epochs. We devise a new coalitional game model that captures the planning of resources, their allocation among players, and cost and revenue sharing. To address fluctuating user demand and evolving participation incentives, we design a mechanism that updates resources and allows the dynamic entrance and exit of players over time. We sustain cooperation through a compensation scheme. Numerical results show that combining resource updates with dynamic participation increases the total payoff and strengthens the NO's incentive to invest.