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GooglePatent applicationNetworks & wirelessInterest 4/10

Google patents network design where every router manages its own traffic

This filing describes a network setup where each router runs its own control software instead of relying on one central server. The routers share status updates with each other to build a complete map of the network, allowing them to calculate the best route for data packets locally.

Why it mattersThis approach could make large data networks more resilient by removing a single point of failure, though it requires complex coordination between many devices.

In the filing’s own words

The present disclosure is a decentralized Software Defined Network (dSDN) which runs individual dSDN controllers at each router in the network, disseminating network state via an inter-router communication protocoll. In some examples, the dSDN is an underlay and is coexistant with an out-of-band software defined network (SDN) control plane, thus achieving a unified architecture that applies across both overlay and underlay. In both the overlay and the underlay, path computation is based on global state, such as a complete view of a network connectivity graph and traffic demands. An end-to-end path that a packet takes may be determined by a localized computation that is run at a single node, such as an SDN controller in the overlay or a head-end router in the dSDN underlay. The network may be partitioned into domains and the same approach may be applied within and across domains.

What exactly they claim (claim 1)

1. A system, comprising: a plurality of routers in a network, each router having a decentralized software-defined networking (dSDN) controller, wherein a first router of the plurality of routers is configured to: receive, at a first dSDN controller of the first router, node states from other routers in the plurality of routers, each node state comprising status information of routers adjacent to a respective router of the other routers; determine, by the first dSDN controller based on the received node states, a global view of the network; compute, by the first dSDN controller, a first set of end-to-end paths over the global view of the network; perform, by the first dSDN controller, a runtime validation of the first set of end-to-end paths to detect errors in the network; and forward, by the first dSDN controller, packets over the first set of end-to-end paths.

Facts

Company
Google (Google LLC)
Official title
Distributed Software Defined Network Architecture
Publication number
US20260291867A1
Application number
19689191
Filed
May 27, 2026
Published
Sep 24, 2026
Inventors
5
Claims
19

Classified under

H04L 45/76 Electricity & electronicsH04L 41/122 Electricity & electronics
Read the full filing (official PDF) ↗ Open in the Patent Tracker

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Summaries are simplified from the filing’s own abstract and first claim. A patent filing is not a product announcement.
Patent data and drawings: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). Nebula is not affiliated with or endorsed by the USPTO.