Cooperative spectrum and infrastructure leasing on TV bands

In this paper, we propose a cooperative wireless infrastructure and spectrum leasing framework for sharing unused TV spectrum, in which the ownership of network infrastructure and spectrum is decoupled, and each can be leased and delivered as a service on demand. An incumbent TV spectrum owner (TSO) can lease a share of the infrastructure from a network infrastructure owner (NIO) with a payper- use model, to provide new services to its end users. On the other hand, the TSO can rent a portion of its unused spectrum to the NIO for revenue such that the NIO can obtain access to the TV spectrum to serve the NIO’s customers. This proposed framework creates a win-win situation by allowing TSO and NIO to lease spectrum and infrastructure from each other for providing services and earning profits.We analyze the interplay between the spectrum owner (TSO) and infrastructure owner (NIO) by formulating a multi-stage Stackelberg game, where TSO and NIO determine the infrastructure leasing price, the amount of infrastructure to lease, the spectrum leasing price, and the amount of spectrum to lease sequentially to maximize their utilities. The best strategies that will be taken by TSO and NIO under different situations are obtained through backward induction. The formed cooperative structure, the network throughput, and the two entities’ utilities are theoretically analyzed when TSO has different levels of idle bandwidth supply.