Apparatus and method for providing enhanced wireless coverage, improved service performance, and reduced battery power consumption

A user equipment (UE) comprising:

• a receiver receiving user plane data for a second UE from a base station in accordance with a first transmission scheme;
• and
• a transmitter coupled to a processor, the transmitter sending the user plane data to the second UE over a device-to-device (D2D) link based on a second transmission scheme without communicating control plane information, that corresponds to the user plane data, over the D2D link, the control plane information being directly communicated from the base station to the second UE, wherein the second UE is subscribed to the base station, wherein the second UE is proximately located relative to the UE, wherein the UE is transparent to the second UE such that the second UE is unaware of the user plane data being routed through the UE, and wherein the UE provides enhanced wireless coverage to the second UE over that provided by the base station.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations for enhancing network service, the operations comprising:

• receiving, by a first user equipment (UE), user plane data for a second UE from a base station in accordance with a first transmission scheme;
• and
• sending, by the first UE, the user plane data to the second UE over a device-to-device (D2D) link based on a second transmission scheme without communicating control plane information, that corresponds to the user plane data, over the D2D link, the control plane information being directly communicated from the base station to the second UE, wherein the second UE is subscribed to the base station, wherein the second UE is proximately located relative to the first UE, wherein the first UE is transparent to the second UE such that the second UE is unaware of the user plane data being routed through the first UE, and wherein the first UE is configured to provide enhanced wireless coverage to the second UE over that provided by the base station.