Patent ID: 8254937

Claim:
A method for a macrocell to reduce signal interference with a femtocell that overlaps the macrocell, the method comprising: assigning, by the macrocell, a first set of frequency sub-channels to be used by cell-center users of the macrocell; assigning, by the macrocell, a second set of frequency sub-channels to be used by cell-edge users of the macrocell; detecting, by the macrocell, that a cell-center user of the macrocell is close enough to the femtocell; assigning, by the macrocell, higher schedule priority for the cell-center user of the macrocell that is close enough to the femtocell to a subset of the first set of frequency sub-channels than to frequency sub-channels in the first set but not in the subset; and setting, by the macrocell, a staged power profile wherein a power assigned for the subset of the first set of frequency sub-channels is higher than a power assigned for frequency sub-channels in the first set but not in the subset.