Patent ID: 8923774

Claim:
A management unit for managing a plurality of multiservice communication devices capable of communicating wireles sly via a plurality of networks, the management unit comprising: a device interface for facilitating a bidirectional data communication with the plurality of multiservice communication devices via a wireless control channel, the bidirectional data communication including outbound control data sent to at least one of the plurality of multiservice communication devices and inbound control data received from at least one of the plurality of multiservice communication devices; a network interface that receives network resource data from the plurality of networks; and a management processing unit, coupled to the device interface and the network interface, that includes a local agent that gathers environmental data that includes RF spectral information pertaining to the RF spectrum in use by the plurality of networks to determine locations where handoffs will be desirable from one network of the plurality of networks to another network of the plurality of networks, wherein the management processing unit processes the inbound control data, the environmental data and the network resource data and that generates the outbound control data in response thereto.