Patent ID: 7539175

Claim:
A multi-access system adapted for allowing communication between a first system and a second system, said multi-access system comprising: first means for receiving and transmitting data using a plurality of communications protocols; and second means for establishing a plurality of communications paths with the use of said first means, each of said communications paths having an available network capacity, and at least some of said communications paths forming an aggregated communications pipe over which the first system can communicate with the second system, said second means being configured to allow communication between the first system and the second system through the simultaneous use of at least two of said at least some of said communications paths such that data streams can be transmitted simultaneously over said at least two communications paths and such that the overall network capacity available for the transmission of the data streams is thereby greater than the network capacity of any one of said at least two communications paths, wherein said second means is configured to simultaneously transmit a first one of the data streams over one of said at least two communications paths and a second one of the data streams over another of said at least two communications paths, the first one of the data streams and the second one of the data streams being associated with a single application.