Patent ID: 7957362

Claim:
A network node in a network having both mesh point nodes and access point nodes, comprising: a transceiver capable of beamforming transmissions and configured to communicate messages having a broadcast portion and a beamformed data portion, the broadcast portion including a Mesh Network Allocation Vector (M-NAV) information transmitted with request to send (RTS) broadcast messages and clear to send (CTS) broadcast messages, wherein the mesh network allocation vector indicates that a beamforming transmission is taking place and said M-NAV is used by a plurality of mesh point nodes as an indication that those mesh point nodes that are outside of a zone of beamforming can continue normal transmission; and a component configured to promote the transceiver being enabled for communication with other network nodes in response to the message including the M-NAV and the message being intended for a specific network node other than the network node, the component configured to promote the transceiver receiving the beamformed data portion of the message in response to the message including the M-NAV and the message being intended for the network node.