Patent ID: 7068624

Claim:
A wireless router for a wireless communications network, comprising: a first interface operable to communicate radio frames for a call with a mobile device, the first interface operable to generate a label for each radio frames received from the mobile device; a second interface operable to communicate wireline packets for the call with a wireline network, the second interface operable to generate a label for each wireline packet received from the wireline network; a traffic controller operable to convert wireline packets received for the call from the wireline network to radio frames, to route the radio frames to the mobile device through the first interface, to convert radio frames received for the call from the mobile device to wireline packets, to route the wireline packets to the wireline network through the second interface, and to communicate with at least one secondary wireless router, wherein the traffic controller is further operable to communicate with wireline packets and radio frames with at least one secondary wireless router for soft handoff of the call and to communicate with a public switched telephone network (PSTN) gateway through the wireline network; and a virtual path generator operable to configure wireless virtual paths for the call in the wireline network to the at least one secondary wireless router for soft handoff processing for the call to the at least one secondary wireless router, wherein the virtual paths are multi-protocol label switched path (MPLS), the traffic controller operable to route wireline packets and radio frames to the at least one secondary wireless router over the wireless virtual paths in accordance with the labels associated with the wireline packets and the radio frames.