Patent ID: 8625565

Claim:
A method performed by an initiating station for multiple-access beamforming for millimeter-wave communications, the method comprising: announcing a number of sector-sweep slots of a beamforming training period and a number of frames of each sector-sweep slot; receiving reverse sector-sweep frames from two or more responding stations within the sector-sweep slots of the beamforming training period; and transmitting sector-sweep feedback frames to the two or more responding stations within the sector-sweep slots to indicate to the responding stations an antenna configuration for communication with the initiating station, wherein for multiple-access beamforming, the initiating station is configured to receive at least two reverse sector-sweep frames from two or more of the responding stations within either a single sector-sweep slot or separate sector-sweep slots of the beamforming training period, wherein the number of sector-sweep slots announced is at least two and the number of frames announced for each sector-sweep slot is at least two, and wherein for multi-access beamforming, the initiating station is arranged to receive data in time-multiplexed (TDM) manner from each of the responding stations in accordance with the antenna configuration indicated in the reverse sector-sweep frame.