The Advantage of Computation Offloading in Multi-Access Edge Computing

Computation offloading plays a critical role in reducing task completion time for mobile devices. The advantages of computation offloading to cloud resources in Mobile Cloud Computing have been widely considered. In this paper, we have investigated different scenarios for offloading to less distant Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC) servers for multiple users with a range of mobile devices and computational tasks. We present detailed simulation data for how offloading can be beneficial in a MEC network with varying quantitative mobile user demand, heterogeneity in mobile device on-board and MEC processor speeds, computational task complexity, communication speeds, link access delays and mobile device user numbers. Unlike previous work where simulations considered only limited communication speeds for offloading, we have extended the range of link speeds and included two types of communication delay. We find that more computationally complex applications are offloaded preferentially (especially with the higher server:mobile device processor speed ratios) while low link speeds and any delays caused by network delays or excessive user numbers degrade any advantages in reduced task completion times offered by offloading. Additionally, significant savings in energy usage by mobile devices are guaranteed except at very low link speeds.