Lawrence M Firestone

US Patent:

63078619, Oct 23, 2001

Filed:

Mar 18, 1999

Appl. No.:

9/271701

Inventors:

Gerald James Hogg - Fountain Hills AZ
Mark Hajime Kaya - Scottsdale AZ
Lawrence Mitchell Firestone - San Diego CA
Shawn Wesley Hogberg - Chandler AZ
Thomas Peter Emmons - Mesa AZ
Israel Arieh Cimet - Chandler AZ

Assignee:

Motorola, Inc. - Schaumburg IL

International Classification:

H04J 326

US Classification:

370432

Abstract:

A multicast message is transmitted from an originating subscriber unit (110, FIG. 1) through a network of satellite communications nodes (120, 130, and 140) to a plurality of receiving subscriber units (150, 160, and 170). Each message is distributed through the network of satellite communications nodes (120, 130, and 140) and replicated at the node nearest to the receiving subscriber unit. Receiving subscriber units (150, 160, and 170) are mapped into geographic cells which allows a single multicast transmission to be transmitted from the satellite communications node to those subscriber units within the same geographic cell. Multicast groups and membership rules are established by the originating subscriber unit (110) through a service provider (180). A multicast session manager (185) manages the multicast session.