Patent ID: 8605723

Claim:
A method in a source edge router connected to a source, comprising the steps of: identifying a plurality of receivers that are requesting to receive data from the source in a session; sending a set of one or more PATH messages to one or more nodes downstream of the source edge router to signal a plurality of separate point-to-point label switched paths (LSPs) between the source edge router and a plurality of receiver edge routers associated with the plurality of receivers, wherein each one of the set of PATH messages includes a same identifier of a point-to-multipoint (P2MP) LSP that includes a session object that contains a tunnel identifier and a P2MP identifier; and receiving, from each of the one or more nodes downstream of the source edge router, a set of one or more RESV messages, wherein each one of the received RESV messages includes the identifier of the P2MP LSP and a label allocated by that downstream node that is to be used by the source edge router when sending traffic of the P2MP LSP to that downstream node.