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The rise of Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) introduce opportunities for service providers to reduce CAPEX/OPEX and to offer and quickly deploy novel network services. In particular, SDN and NFV enable the flexible composition of network functions, a generic service concept known as network service chaining (NSC).

However, the control of resources, management and configuration of network service chains is challenging. In particular, there typically exist multiple options on how an abstract network service can be decomposed into more refined, inter-connected network functions. Moreover, efficient algorithms have to be devised to allocate the network functions. The underlying algorithmic problem can be seen as a novel generalization of the Virtual Network Embedding Problem (VNEP), where there exist multiple realization options. The joint optimization of …