Patent ID: 7257403

Claim:
A method for controlling handover of radio connections between first and second mobile radio communication systems that use different types of radio access technology, comprising: for a radio connection between the first mobile radio communications system and a user equipment (UE) established using an anchor node, processing a handover request for the UE connection to the second mobile radio communications system that includes a non-anchor node; constructing handover information based on UE subscription information for a subscriber associated with the UE and mobile radio communications system operator information representing rights of the subscriber associated with the UE regarding changing between different types of radio access technologies, the handover information including first handover information indicating whether handover of the connection from the first mobile radio communications system to the second mobile radio communications system is permitted and second handover information indicating whether handover from the second mobile radio communications system to the first mobile radio communications system is permitted, wherein the UE handover information includes a first handover information element formatted in accordance with a first format employed in the first mobile radio communications system and a second handover information element formatted in accordance with a second format employed in the second mobile radio communications system; providing handover information by the anchor node for the UE to the non-anchor node in the second mobile radio communications system; and using the provided UE handover information to determine whether to permit a handover of the connection from the first mobile radio communications system to the second mobile radio communications system and from the second mobile radio communications system to the first mobile radio communications system without having to contact the UE or use statistical cell-related information, wherein when the UE handover information indicates that a requested handover is not permitted, preventing the requested handover even though there may be sufficient resources to support the requested handover.