Broadcom Corporation

Avago Technologies General IP (singapore) Pte. Ltd.

Avago Technologies International Sales Pte. Limited

Boadcom Corporation

Avago Technologies General IP Pte, Ltd.

Rich Prodan

Jeyhan Karaoguz

Xuemin Chen

Wael William Diab

David Garrett

David Albert Lundgren

Wael Willliam Diab

A broadband gateway, which enables communication with a plurality of devices, handles at least one physical layer connection to at least one corresponding network access service provider. The broadband gateway may operate as a home gateway to negotiate with one or more visited gateways, a common authorized service area or domain (ASD) for providing services to the visited gateways. The home gateway may establish one or more corresponding communication links with the visited gateways based on the negotiated common ASD. The home gateway communicates corresponding content for the services to the visited gateways via the established corresponding communication links. The home gateway communicates information about gateway functionalities required for the services to the visited gateways. The visited gateways may port gateway functionalities forwarded by the home gateway, or may perform gateway functionality conversion to support the services, which may be acquired via the home gateway and/or the visited gateways from networks.

Method and system for porting gateway functionality associated with a user from a first gateway to one or more other gateways

Aspects of a method and system for customized acquisition of content by a broadband gateway are provided. A broadband gateway may be operable to determine options for acquiring particular content. The broadband gateway may be operable to rank the determined options. The ranking may be based on one or more characteristics of the options and based on user-specified criteria. The broadband gateway may be operable to select one of the options for acquiring the content based on results of the ranking. One or more of the options may be available via a first physical layer connection and one or more of the options may be available via a second physical layer connection. The gateway may rank the determined options based on attributes of one or more devices via which the particular content will be consumed.

Customized acquisition of content by a broadband gateway

A broadband gateway, which enables communication with a plurality of devices, handles at least one physical layer connection to at least one corresponding network access service provider. The broadband gateway determines network channel conditions for a requested service and identifies a user profile for a requesting device. The broadband gateway negotiates a service profile for the requested service with the at least one network access service provider based on the determined network conditions and the identified user profile. Content may be acquired and received for the requested service from the at least one network access service provider utilizing the negotiated service profile. The broadband gateway aggregates and assembles the received content. The resulting assembled content is communicated to the requesting device for the requested service. The broadband gateway may relay content among peer devices. Content conversion may be performed during the relay communication to match user profiles of subsequent peer devices.

Method and system for content aggregation via a broadband gateway

Aspects of a method and system for managing quality of service via a broadband gateway are provided. In this regard, a broadband gateway that supports one or more first QoS protocols may determine, based on communications with a plurality of communication devices, whether each of the plurality of communication devices supports the one or more first QoS protocols. The gateway may communicate a result of the determination to a content provider and/or service provider. In this manner, the content provider and/or service provider may determine whether to utilize one or more second QoS protocols to deliver content to a particular one of said plurality of communication devices based on whether said particular of communication devices based on whether said particular one of said plurality of communication devices supports the one or more first QoS protocols. The gateway may be operable to map between QoS protocols.

Method and system for managing quality of service via a broadband gateway

A broadband gateway may be used to authorize transactions associated with one or more accounts, which may be associated with a user of the broadband gateway. The transaction may be handled by the broadband gateway. The authorizations may be performed based on information associated with the accounts, whose storage may be controlled by the broadband gateway. The broadband gateway may block and/or terminate transactions failing authentication and/or validation, which may be performed based on the stored information. The transactions may be initiated within a network serviced by the broadband gateway. The transactions may also be initiated outside the serviced network. The stored information may comprise a user profile, which may comprise a plurality of settings for controlling and/or managing authorization performed by the broadband gateway. The user profiles may be configurable by users, wherein configuration may comprise initializing and/or modifying one or more of the transaction related settings.

Method and system for providing secure transactions via a broadband gateway

A method and system are provided in which a broadband gateway may receive different content from different sources, may combine the content to produce a combined content, and may communicate the combined content to a device connected to the broadband gateway. The content may be automatically and/or manually synchronized. The synchronization may be based on a clock signal received from the device, a clock signal from another device connected to the broadband gateway, and/or a clock signal received through one or more network access service providers. The content may be video image data and/or audio data. Moreover, user-generated content may be received and combined by the broadband gateway when in a peer-to-peer communication configuration with the source of the content. When more than two different content are received, the broadband gateway may be utilized to select which contents to combine.

Method and system for combining and/or blending multiple content from different sources in a broadband gateway

A broadband gateway may be operable to receive network topology information to enable peer-to-peer communications between a first communication device and a second communication device. The first communication device is communicatively coupled to the broadband gateway. The broadband gateway may be operable to handle at least one physical layer connection to at least one corresponding network access service provider. A communication link which may bypass core layer network components and/or resources for enabling the peer-to-peer communications between the first communication device and the second communication device may be established by the broadband gateway, based on the received network topology information, a location of the first communication device and a location of the second communication device. The broadband gateway may establish the communication link to enable the peer-to-peer communications by marking traffic such as by inserting QinQ tags into traffic between the first communication device and the second communication device.

Method and system for utilizing a gateway to enable peer-to-peer communications in service provider networks

A broadband gateway may provision services requested in a home network managed and/or serviced by the broadband gateway by a user associated with the broadband gateway, based on determination of criteria related to the requested service. The requested service may comprise obtaining and/or delivering content for consumption by one or more of a plurality of devices serviced by the broadband gateway in the home network. The criteria may comprise device related data, user preference related information, service performance related parameters, payment related information, and/or energy use related information. The broadband gateway may store information associated with the determined criteria. Provisioning requested services may comprise negotiating with at least one remote resource that may support at least a portion of the requested service. The negotiation may comprise brokering and/or arbitrating a plurality of options of remote resources utilized for providing the at least a portion of the requested service.

Utilizing a gateway for brokering and/or arbitrating service consumption options

A broadband gateway may manage confidential data associated with users in a home network managed and/or serviced by the broadband gateway. The broadband gateway may store the user confidential data broadband gateway in a distributed manner, wherein the confidential data may be divided into a plurality of portions and stored separately in multiple storage locations or devices. When users authorize the transfer of the confidential data, all portions may be communicated to enable aggregating them such that the confidential data may be obtained. The user confidential data may be encrypted. The broadband gateway may securely communicate and/or share the user confidential user data. This may be achieved by tracking communication of the user confidential data, by using tags incorporated into the data. The broadband gateway may also ensure that communicated confidential data is rendered unusable under certain conditions, based on use for various timing tags for example.

Providing secure communication and/or sharing of personal data via a broadband gateway

Aspects of a method and system for providing emergency-related services via a broadband gateway are provided. In this regard, a broadband gateway may receive one or more emergency notification messages, generate one or more alert messages in response to the received emergency notification message(s), and communicate the alert message(s) to the electronic device(s). Accordingly, each of the one or more alert messages may be formatted for communication to a corresponding one or corresponding ones of the one or more electronic devices. The emergency notification message(s) may be generated by an emergency services provider in response to an emergency. The emergency services provider may send a notification message to the broadband gateway device upon determining that the broadband gateway device, a person associated with the broadband gateway device, and/or a location associated with the broadband gateway device meets particular criteria.

Method and system for providing emergency related services via a broadband gateway

Aspects of a method and system for adaptive multimedia delivery via a broadband gateway are provided. A broadband gateway may be operable to determine which one or more of a plurality of devices is communicatively coupled to the broadband gateway. Content may be requested from, and/or scheduled to be delivered to, one or more of the devices. The gateway may be operable to select a provider from which to request the content based on results of the determining. The provider may be selected based on a bandwidth of a link between the broadband gateway and the one or more devices to which the content is to be delivered. The gateway may be operable to select one of a plurality of versions of the content based on results of the determining and requesting the selected version of the content from the selected content provider.

Adaptive multimedia delivery via a broadband gateway

A broadband gateway may be used to provide peer-to-peer communications with other broadband gateways. One or more peer-to-peer connections may be configured with each of the other broadband gateway, for use in peer-to-peer communications, which may be utilized to communicate shared content among the broadband gateways. Users may receive incentives for participating in peer-to-peer communications, comprising sharing credits and/or reduced charges. The broadband gateway may track and/or aggregate sharing credits based on communication of shared content. Peer-to-peer connections may be configured using at least one physical layer connection utilized by the broadband gateway in communicating with corresponding access network service provider. Peer-to-peer connections may also be configured using direct connections and/or links between the broadband gateways. The broadband gateway may generate a directory for use in conjunction with peer-to-peer operations. The directory may be presented via a user interface. The broadband gateway may generate and/or communicate peer-to-peer related alerts.

Method and system for utilizing a broadband gateway for peer to peer communications

A method and system are provided in which a content request may be received by a broadband gateway from a device connected to the broadband gateway through a home network. The broadband gateway may select content that corresponds to the request from content that is available through a network access service provider and/or from other devices in the home network. The selection of the content corresponding to the request may be based on capability information of the device. The capability information may comprise display, audio reproduction, encoding, decoding, and/or storage capabilities, for example. The selection may be based on an optimization associated with a bandwidth to transfer the content within the home network and/or a power consumed to process the content. The content that is selected may be received and processed by the broadband gateway, and/or by another device in the home network, before being communicated to the device.

Method and system for optimizing communication in a home network via a gateway

A broadband gateway configured to operate as a virtual broadband gateway may comprise a network portion and a local portion. The network portion is communicatively coupled to the local portion via a plurality of physical layer connections to one or more network access service providers. The virtual broadband gateway may acquire content from one or more providers, process the content for delivery to one or more local devices, and deliver the content to the one or more local devices. The remote portion may be implemented in one or more network devices. The network devices may be owned and/or operated by one or more content providers, one or more network access service providers, and/or one or more independent entities. Gateway functions performed by the network portion may comprise, for example, content downloading, content streaming, content authentication, data format conversion, service negotiation, service selection, data encryption, data decryption and/or data storage.

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Niwot, CO, United States of America

Rich Prodan