* Are you sure the branch has a 1 GB/s connection to HQ? 1GB/s possible, but quite good for current standards.
* The network is as slow as the slowest link. Are you sure that the slowest link between the branch client and HQ server is 1GB/sec? If traffic is routed over public internet between branch and HQ, there are likely some bottlenecks beyond your control
* Is there network latency between branch and headquarters? Even on high bandwidth connections, network latency can cause low data transfer rates because some protocols are very chatty: the next packet is sent only after receiving acknowledgment for the previous packet. With high latency networks, this may result in sometimes very poor transfer speeds