The paper describes a policy-based model for cost-effective 'data connectivity' provisioning between session-level end-points. Data flows with closely-similar QoS needs are aggregated over an end-to-end logical path. The available infrastructure bandwidth is apportioned between various paths that carry (aggregated) data flows with distinct QoS levels. Flow aggregation over a path allows reaping the statistical multiplexing gains in bandwidth. Whereas, a path-level bandwidth allocation allows meeting the QoS needs of data flows sharing this path. The SP installs policy functions at the end-points that can make the connectivity provisioning cost-optimal in different operating regions of the system.
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