Patent ID: 7412257

Claim:
In a gateway for a telephone network that comprises multiple individually addressable telephone lines and telephones, each telephone connected to one of the individually addressable telephone lines, a method of routing calls, outbound from the telephones to any of a plurality of mobile phones that are connected to the gateway such that any of the mobile phones can be used for the calls outbound from any of the telephones, the method comprising acts of: the gateway receiving a first outbound call from a first telephone connected to the gateway through a first individually addressable telephone line; the gateway applying one or more routing rules to the first outbound call for selecting a first mobile phone that is connected to the gateway through which the first outbound call is to be routed; and connecting the first outbound call to the first selected mobile phone wherein a second outbound call from a second telephone connected to the gateway through a second individually addressable telephone line that is different from the first individually addressable telephone line is connected to the first selected mobile phone, the first selected mobile phone being selected by applying the one or more rules to the second outbound call so that outbound calls from different telephones can be connected through the same mobile phone.