Software Defined Access (“SDA”) is a network architecture for heterogeneous

networks that extends the concept of software defined networking for the core network

to mobile devices connected at the network edge. SDA integrates various data

networks available to mobile devices into a virtual network infrastructure and provides a

logical control path to mobile devices. The logical control path enables the SDA

architecture to dynamically configure mobile devices and the flows associated with

them. Moreover, SDA provides mechanisms to learn the unknown and time-varying

underlying network states as well as user preferences. This information is then used to

optimize network performance by adaptively configuring flow paths. The proposed SDA

architecture design is independent of network operators and underlying wireless

technologies.