Granted Patent B2

US 12,621,649 · App. 17/948,282 · Granted May 5, 2026

Inventor: Chiu-Wen Chen (Hong Kong, CN)

Assignee: Purplevine Innovation Company Limited

H04W8/183H04W36/0016H04W48/16H04W74/0841H04W76/20H04W76/27H04W84/042

Abstract

Claims (77)

1 . A wireless communication method by a user equipment (UE) for onboarding and provisioning in non-public network (NPN), comprising:

receiving, by the UE, an NPN cell identification imposed on an access stratum (AS) level from a first next generation radio access network (NG-RAN);

performing, by the UE, an NPN cell subscription on the AS level for identifying an NPN-capable UE at the first NG-RAN;

receiving, by the UE, a measurement configuration based on the NPN cell identification and the NPN cell subscription on the AS level, wherein the measurement configuration is used to indicate to the UE that the first NG-RAN has identified the NPN-capable UE;

wherein the NPN cell subscription on the AS level for identifying the NPN-capable UE at the first NG-RAN comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a preamble sequence for NPN is transmitted in a random access channel (RACH) on an uplink (UL) bandwidth part (BWP) by the UE; or

wherein an NPN connection cause, serving as a connection purpose indication and carrying no NPN-related identifier, is transmitted in a radio resource control (RRC) signaling on the UL BWP; or

wherein a pre-configured UL BWP for NPN is used to transmit a normal preamble sequence;

wherein an inter-node message exchange is performed between a master node (MN) used the first NG-RAN and a secondary node (SN) used as the second NG-RAN;

wherein the SN addition with the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL applies for the NPN-capable UE to establish a radio (NR) multi-connection in an RRC CONNECTED state.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the NPN cell identification imposed on the AS level comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a synchronization sequence for NPN is transmitted in one or more synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) on an initial BWP by an NPN cell;

wherein in a broadcasting system information on a downlink (DL) BWP, an NPN identifier (ID) is present in an NPN access related information element (IE) and an NPN access permission is present in a cell usage IE;

wherein the DL BWP for NPN is used to transmit an SSB and related system information; or

wherein an access class permission is transmitted in system information on the DL BWP for NPN access allowance.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein if the first NG-RAN receives a mobility restriction from an NG-Core before a UE handover, the UE receives the measurement configuration configured by the first NG-RAN for UL.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising identifying the NPN cell and performing a measurement for an indicated NPN cell list, by the NPN-capable UE, according to the measurement configuration;

wherein the NPN-capable UE is configured to camp either on an SNPN cell or a PNI-NPN cell with a RAN functional split based on the NPN cell subscription on the AS level for UL.

5 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

identifying the NPN cell and performing a measurement for an indicated NPN cell list, by the NPN-capable UE, according to the measurement configuration; and

camping on a second NG-RAN used as either a stand-alone non-public network (SNPN) cell or a public network integrated NPN (PNI-NPN) cell, by the NPN-capable UE, based on a UE manual cell selection and/or re-selection.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein for the UE manual cell selection and/or re-selection, when a best cell according to a selection and/or re-selection priority rule is an NPN cell which is in a pre-configured NPN cell list and not in an allowed NPN cell list, the NPN-capable UE excludes the best cell as candidate for cell reselection and proceeds to evaluate another cell on the same frequency for cell reselection.

7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein for the UE manual cell selection and/or re-selection, when a best cell according to a selection and/or re-selection priority rule is an NPN cell which is in an allowed NPN cell list and not in a pre-configured NPN cell list, the NPN-capable UE accepts the best cell as candidate for cell reselection.

8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein an NPN membership of the NPN is checked by one or more RAN nodes comprising the first NG-RAN based on the NPN cell subscription on the AS level.

9 . The method of claim 2 , wherein a cell reselection with the NPN cell identification on the AS level is used for the NPN-capable UE to switch a DU-connection in an RRC_CONNECTED state; and wherein the cell reselection with the NPN cell identification on the AS level is determined by detecting a setting of the NPN access related information IE and/or the cell usage IE to true.

10 . The method of claim 3 , wherein an NPN-capable UE is controlled by the first NG-RAN to report one or more candidate NPN cells and/or a human-readable network name (HRNN), and the first NG-RAN is configured to perform a handover triggering and decision according to the one or more candidate NPN cells and/or the HRNN.

11 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the NPN-capable UE in an RRC_INACTIVE state is controlled by the first NG-RAN to transmit an RRC message with a resume ID, an original NPN cell ID, and/or a resume cause.

12 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first NG-RAN used as a gNB comprises a centralized unit (CU) and one or more distributed units (DUs), and an F1 interface is defined between the CU and the one or more DUs;

wherein at mobility, a cell reselection for an inter-gNB-DU mobility via the F1 interface is based on the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL.

13 . The method of claim 4 , wherein after a cell loading check procedure between a target gNB-CU and a target gNB-DU, a handover command is transmitted from the target gNB-CU to the serving gNB-CU.

14 . The method of claim 13 , wherein a CAG list and/or a NID list is transmitted over the F1 interface for the NPN cell subscription on the AS level for UL during the cell loading check procedure, and/or a downlink RRC transfer is used to carry a DL RRC message.

15 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the UE is controlled by the MN to transmit an RRC connection reconfiguration complete with the NPN cell subscription and/or an SN NPN cell ID to a non-access stratum (NAS) level.

16 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the SN addition with the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL applies for the NPN-capable UE to establish a new radio (NR) multi-connection in an RRC_CONNECTED state.

17 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the SN addition request with the mobility restriction of the UE is transmitted from the gNB-CU of the MN to a gNB-CU of the SN.

18 . The method of claim 17 , wherein an intra-gNB-CU handover operation with the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL applies for the NPN-capable UE to switch a DU-connection in an RRC_CONNECTED state, and/or an inter-PLMN with a switching of multiple DU-connections in an NPN is based on the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL.

19 . A user equipment (UE), comprising:

a memory;

a transceiver; and

a processor coupled to the memory and the transceiver;

wherein the transceiver is configured to receive an NPN cell identification imposed on an access stratum (AS) level from a first next generation radio access network (NG-RAN);

wherein the processor is configured to perform an NPN cell subscription on the AS level for identifying an NPN-capable UE at the first NG-RAN;

wherein the transceiver is configured to receive a measurement configuration based on the NPN cell identification and the NPN cell subscription on the AS level, wherein the measurement configuration is used to indicate to the UE that the first NG-RAN has identified the NPN-capable UE;

wherein the NPN cell subscription on the AS level comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a preamble sequence for NPN is transmitted in a random access channel (RACH) on an uplink (UL) bandwidth part (BWP) by the UE; or

wherein an NPN connection cause, serving as a connection purpose indication and carrying no NPN-related identifier, is transmitted in a radio resource control (RRC) signaling on the UL BWP; or

wherein a pre-configured UL BWP for NPN is used to transmit a normal preamble sequence;

wherein an inter-node message exchange is performed between a master node MN) and a secondary node (SN) used as a second NG-RAN;

wherein the SN addition with the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL applies for the NPN-capable UE to establish a new radio (NR) multi-connection in an RRC_CONNECTED state.

20 . The UE of claim 19 , wherein the NPN cell identification imposed on the AS level comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a synchronization sequence for NPN is transmitted in one or more synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) on an initial BWP by an NPN cell;

wherein in a broadcasting system information on a downlink (DL) BWP, an NPN identifier (ID) is present in an NPN access related information element (IE) and an NPN access permission is present in a cell usage IE;

wherein the DL BWP for NPN is used to transmit an SSB and related system information; or

wherein an access class permission is transmitted in system information on the DL BWP for NPN access allowance.

21 . The UE of claim 19 , wherein if the first NG-RAN receives a mobility restriction from an NG-Core before a UE handover, the UE receives the measurement configuration configured by the first NG-RAN for UL.

22 . The UE of claim 19 , wherein an NPN membership of the NPN is checked by one or more RAN nodes comprising the first NG-RAN based on the NPN cell subscription on the AS level.

23 . A wireless communication method by a user equipment (UE) for onboarding and provisioning in non-public network (NPN), comprising:

receiving, by the UE, an NPN cell identification imposed on an access stratum (AS) level from a first next generation radio access network (NG-RAN);

performing, by the UE, an NPN cell subscription on the AS level for identifying an NPN-capable UE at the first NG-RAN;

receiving, by the UE, a measurement configuration based on the NPN cell identification and the NPN cell subscription on the AS level, wherein the measurement configuration is used to indicate to the UE that the first NG-RAN has identified the NPN-capable UE;

wherein the NPN cell subscription on the AS level for identifying the NPN-capable UE at the first NG-RAN comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a preamble sequence for NPN is transmitted in a random access channel (RACH) on an uplink (UL) bandwidth part (BWP) by the UE; or

wherein an NPN connection cause, serving as a connection purpose indication and carrying no NPN-related identifier, is transmitted in a radio resource control (RRC) signaling on the UL BWP; or

wherein a pre-configured UL BWP for NPN is used to transmit a normal preamble sequence;

wherein an inter-node message exchange is performed between a master node (MN) and a secondary node (SN) used as a second NG-RAN;

wherein an SN addition request with a mobility restriction of the UE and an SN addition request acknowledge with the NPN cell identification on the AS level for DL is transmitted for SN addition;

wherein upon a reception of the SN addition request acknowledgement, the MN transmits an RRC connection reconfiguration with an NPN cell ID for SN addition.

24 . The method of claim 23 , wherein the NPN cell identification imposed on the AS level comprises at least one of the following:

wherein a synchronization sequence for NPN is transmitted in one or more synchronization signal blocks (SSBs) on an initial BWP by an NPN cell;

wherein in a broadcasting system information on a downlink (DL) BWP, an NPN identifier (ID) is present in an NPN access related information element (IE) and an NPN access permission is present in a cell usage IE;

wherein the DL BWP for NPN is used to transmit an SSB and related system information; or

wherein an access class permission is transmitted in system information on the DL BWP for NPN access allowance.

25 . The UE of claim 24 , wherein the cell reselection with the NPN cell identification on the AS level is determined by detecting a setting of the NPN access related information IE and/or the cell usage IE to true.

26 . The UE of claim 23 , wherein if the first NG-RAN receives a mobility restriction from an NG-Core before a UE handover, the UE receives the measurement configuration configured by the first NG-RAN for UL.

27 . The method of claim 23 , further comprising identifying the NPN cell and performing a measurement for an indicated NPN cell list, by the NPN-capable UE, according to the measurement configuration;

wherein the NPN-capable UE is configured to camp either on an SNPN cell or a PNI-NPN cell based on the NPN cell subscription on the AS level for UL.

28 . The method of claim 23 , wherein an NPN membership of the NPN is checked by one or more RAN nodes comprising the first NG-RAN based on the NPN cell subscription on the AS level.

29 . The method of claim 23 , wherein the first NG-RAN used as a gNB comprises a centralized unit (CU) and one or more distributed units (DUs), and an F1 interface is defined between the CU and the one or more DUs.

Assignments (2)

Continuity (3)

References Cited (31)