  There has been an exponential increase in the usage of multimedia services in
mobile networks in recent years. To address this accelerating data demand,
mobile networks are experiencing a subtle transformation in their architecture.
One of the changes in this direction is the support of Multicast/Broadcast
Service (MBS) in the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Fifth
Generation (5G) network. The MBS has been introduced to enhance resource
utilization and user experience in 3GPP 5G networks. However, there are certain
limitations in the 3GPP 5G MBS architecture, such as the selection of the
delivery method (unicast or broadcast) by the core network (may result in
sub-optimal radio resource utilization) and no provision for converging
non-3GPP broadcast technologies (like digital terrestrial television) with
cellular (3GPP 5G) broadband. In this context, we propose a new architecture
for the convergence of cellular broadband and non-3GPP broadcast networks. A
novelty of the architecture is that it treats signalling exchange with User
Equipment (UE) as data (service) which results in improved scalability of
mobile networks. The architecture supports enhanced flexibility in choosing a
delivery method (3GPP 5G unicast, 3GPP 5G broadcast, or non-3GPP broadcast) for
user data. We evaluate the performance of the proposed architecture using
process algebra-based simulations, demonstrating a significant reduction in the
number of signalling messages exchanged between the UE and the network for MBS
session establishment as compared to the 3GPP 5G network.
