Patent ID: 7796636

Claim:
A Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) communication apparatus that, by allocating a plurality of slots to a single frame in a time-divided manner, effects transmission of a first communication signal during slots reserved by communicating stations by performing respective slot synchronization and, along with that, effects transmission of a second communication signal without the slot synchronization being performed, the apparatus comprising: a reserved slot storage unit that stores reserved slots for each of the stations, an overlapping reserved slot storage unit that stores corresponding slots as overlapping reserved slots when the present station's transmission is subject to reservation by another station, and a control unit that, along with computing a transmission time length for the second communication signal being transmitted, computes a standby time length from the present time until the time of receipt of the first communication signal or the time of transmission of the next first communication signal read from the reserved slot storage unit, effects transmission control over the second communication signal if the transmission time length is detected to be shorter than the standby time length, holds the second communication signal pending if the transmission time length is detected to be longer than the standby time length, and wherein at the timing when compilation starts for the overlapping reserved slots, the control unit selects a signal transmitted during the overlapping reserved slots based on information from the overlapping reserved slot storage unit.