Methods and apparatus for reducing power consumption for mobile devices using broadcast-to-unicast message conversion

A mobile communication device, comprising:

• a wireless receiver;
• a wireless transmitter;
• one or more processors coupled to the wireless receiver and the wireless transmitter;
• the one or more processors being configured to:
• cause a message to be sent to a wireless network via the wireless transmitter, the message indicating a plurality of different protocol types of broadcast messages to be processed as broadcast-to-unicast messages for the mobile device during a low power mode of operation, the protocol type of a given broadcast message being identifiable in a protocol identifier field of the broadcast message;
• maintain at least a portion of the wireless receiver in a powered down state during the low power mode of operation while broadcast messages are broadcasted from the wireless network;
• and
• for each broadcast message of each said indicated protocol type provided in the message sent to the wireless network, receive via the wireless receiver a unicast message from the wireless network and identify broadcast message information of the broadcast message within the unicast message.