LAUSR

NFV can effectively improve the flexibility of resource allocation and save energy consumption in networks. With NFV, the servers in communication networks can be virtualized as different types of VMs, including SIVMs and CIVMs. To deal with the ever-increasing traffic, in this article, we study the cooperation of servers at different locations. This can efficiently and flexibly utilize the communication, caching, and computing resources to minimize network energy consumption with QoS guarantee. Specifically, we first investigate the impacts of different types of VMs on network performance. Then, we propose a joint allocation of different types of VMs in different servers, and discuss the tradeoffs between SIVMs and CIVMs. Case studies are also provided to verify the feasibility of VM based multi-point cooperation. Finally, potential research directions are presented to shed light on the future study of VM cooperation.