Patent ID: 7983157

Claim:
A bandwidth control system comprising: a plurality of pre-stage controllers, said pre-stage controllers receiving a packet from each of plural user devices, deriving priority information on the basis of a sum of ratios of user bandwidths of respective ones of the plural user devices, the user bandwidths being contractual minimum bandwidths of the respective ones of the plural user devices in connection with input/output ports, and the ratios each being of a corresponding user bandwidth relative to a whole bandwidth of an input/output port used by the corresponding user device, transmitting the priority information, and transmitting the packet upon receiving packet transmission permission; and a post-stage controller for receiving the priority information from the pre-stage controllers, selecting, on the basis of the priority information, one of the pre-stage controllers to be given the packet transmission permission, transmitting the packet transmission permission to the selected pre-stage controller, receiving the packet from the selected pre-stage controller, and transmitting the packet to the network.