Beam Failure Detection and Recovery for Deactivated Secondary Cell Group (SCG)

A method for a second network node configured to provide a secondary cell group (SCG) for a user equipment (UE) in a wireless network, the method comprising:

• while the UE is in an activated mode for the SCG, sending to the UE via the UE's master cell group (MCG) a first command to enter a reduced-energy mode for the SCG, wherein the first command includes one or more of the following information that is specific to the reduced-energy mode for the SCG:
• an SCG beam failure detection (BFD) configuration, and
• a subset of serving cells comprising the SCG;
• and
• receiving, from a first network node configured to provide the UE's MCG, an indication that the UE detected a beam failure in the SCG while the UE was in the reduced-energy mode for the SCG, wherein the indication is an SCG failure information field in a Radio Resource Control (RRC) message, wherein the SCG failure information field has a particular value that indicates beam failure.

A method for a first network node configured to provide a master cell group (MCG) for a user equipment (UE) in a wireless network, the method comprising:

• while the UE is in an activated mode for a secondary cell group (SCG) provided by a second network node in the wireless network, sending to the UE a first command to enter a reduced-energy mode for the SCG, wherein the first command includes one or more of the following information that is specific to the reduced-energy mode for the SCG:
• an SCG beam failure detection (BFD) configuration, and
• a subset of serving cells comprising the SCG;
• while the UE is in the activated mode for the MCG and in the reduced-energy for the SCG, receiving from the UE, an indication that the UE detected a beam failure in the SCG while the UE was in the reduced-energy mode for the SCG, wherein the indication is an SCG failure information field in a Radio Resource Control (RRC) message, wherein the SCG failure information field has a particular value that indicates beam failure;
• and
• forwarding the indication to the second network node.