Bandwidth part (BWP) for unicast/multicast and resource allocation for multicast

A method supporting multicast services at a base station, comprising:

• determining, at the base station, a multicast bandwidth part (BWP) within a carrier bandwidth;
• sending, by the base station, an indication of the multicast BWP to one or more user equipments UEs in communication with the base station, wherein the multicast BWP is a common frequency bandwidth resource configured to be used by at least a portion of the one or more UEs in communication with the base station;
• scheduling, by the base station, transmission of multicast data in the multicast BWP;
• and
• for each of the one or more UEs:
• determining, by the base station, whether the common frequency bandwidth resource has a same subcarrier spacing (SCS) and cyclic prefix (CP) length as a UE-specific BWP and the common frequency bandwidth resource is fully contained within the UE-specific BWP;
• and
• sending, by the base station, an indication of a search space set for multicast to the respective UE in response to determining that the common frequency bandwidth resource has a same SCS and CP length as the UE-specific BWP and that the common frequency bandwidth resource is fully contained within the UE-specific BWP.

A user equipment (UE), comprising:

• a processor configured with processor-executable instructions to perform operations comprising:
• receiving an indication of a multicast bandwidth part (BWP) within a carrier bandwidth from a base station of a wireless network;
• receiving multicast data from the base station in the multicast BWP, wherein the multicast BWP is a common frequency bandwidth resource configured to be used by at least a portion of one or more UEs in communication with the base station;
• and
• receiving an indication of a search space set for multicast from the base station when the common frequency bandwidth resource has a same subcarrier spacing (SCS) and cyclic prefix (CP) length as a UE-specific BWP and the common frequency bandwidth resource is fully contained within the UE-specific BWP.

A method for radio resource allocation performed at a user equipment (UE) for receiving multicast services from a base station, comprising:

• receiving, by the UE, an indication of a multicast bandwidth part (BWP) within a carrier bandwidth from a base station;
• receiving, by the the UE, multicast data from the base station in the multicast BWP, wherein the multicast BWP is a common frequency bandwidth resource configured to be used by at least a portion of one or more UEs in communication with the base station;
• and
• receiving, by the UE, an indication of a search space set for multicast when the common frequency bandwidth resource has a same subcarrier spacing (SCS) and cyclic prefix (CP) length as a UE-specific BWP and the common frequency bandwidth resource is fully contained within the UE-specific BWP.