Patent ID: 7978653

Claim:
A data transfer apparatus comprising: a data transmitting device which extracts pieces of untransmitted data from a plurality of contents as transmission targets respectively and transmits the extracted pieces of untransmitted data to a plurality of mobile terminals respectively through a communication line; a destination point recording device on which destination point information expressing destination points as travel destinations of users of the mobile terminals is recorded; an arrival time calculating device which acquires current position information expressing current positions of the mobile terminals and current time information expressing a current time at intervals of a predetermined time in order to calculate latest moving velocities of the mobile terminals based on the current position information and the current time information acquired at a previous time and the current position information and the current time information acquired at this time, and then to calculate estimated times of arrival as estimated times that the users of the mobile terminals will arrive at the destination points, based on the calculated moving velocities of the mobile terminals and distances from the current positions of the mobile terminals to the destination points; a required transfer rate calculating device which calculates required data transfer rates necessary for the mobile terminals to complete download of the pieces of untransmitted data before the users of the mobile terminals arrive at the destination points, based on times obtained by subtracting the current time from the estimated times of arrival calculated by the arrival time calculating device and data capacities of the pieces of untransmitted data; and an occupied transfer rate calculating device which assigns required bandwidths for achievement of the required data transfer rates to the respective mobile terminals in order of estimated time of arrival to prevent the sum of the required bandwidths from exceeding a total bandwidth of the communication line to thereby calculate occupied data transfer rates to be really used for the respective mobile terminals based on the assigned required bandwidths; wherein: the data transmitting device transmits the pieces of untransmitted data to the respective mobile terminals through the communication line in accordance with the respective occupied data transfer rates calculated by the occupied transfer rate calculating device.