Physical routing appliance to connect enterprise networks and cloud computing services, and method of connection

A physical routing appliance comprising:

• a processor;
• and
• a non-transitory memory storing instructions which, when executed by the processor, perform the following:
• responsive to connection of the physical routing appliance to a user installation, configuring the physical routing appliance to communicate with a cloud service;
• initiating communication between the physical routing appliance and a cloud service to connect the physical routing appliance to the cloud service, including selecting a type of connection between the physical routing appliance and the cloud service;
• responsive to connection of the physical routing appliance to the cloud service, determining whether there is a virtual private cloud for the user installation at the cloud service;
• determining whether there is a virtual routing appliance for the user installation at the cloud service;
• and
• responsive to a determination that there is a virtual routing appliance for the user installation at the cloud service, initiating a multiplexed virtual private network (VPN) communication path between the physical routing appliance and the virtual routing appliance, wherein communications between the user installation and the cloud service comprise:
• at the physical routing appliance, multiplexing first system data received from the user installation for transmission to the virtual routing appliance as first multiplexed data;
• at the virtual routing appliance, multiplexing second system data received from the cloud service for transmission to the physical routing appliance as second multiplexed data;
• receiving the second multiplexed data from the virtual routing appliance and demultiplexing the second multiplexed data for transmission to the user installation;
• receiving the first multiplexed data from the physical routing appliance and demultiplexing the second multiplexed data for transmission to the cloud service;
• and
• creating a plurality of paths to transmit the first and second multiplexed data between the physical routing appliance and the virtual routing appliance to enable transmission of the first and second multiplexed data as multiplexed data portions without having to retransmit all of the first and second system data.