Patent ID: 8774110

Claim:
A method comprising: estimating, by a network access station, channel characteristics of a channel between the network access station and a transmit cluster, the network access station having a receiving antenna array of a plurality of antennas, and the transmit cluster comprising at least two wireless devices that cooperatively operate as a single multiple-input, multiple output (MIMO) entity, wherein individual wireless devices include a transmitting antenna array of at least one antenna; determining, by the network access station, transmitting antenna array subsets of the transmitting antenna arrays for the individual wireless devices within the transmit cluster based on the channel characteristics; determining, by the network access station, a modulation scheme for communication via the channel based on the channel characteristics; transmitting, by the network access station, the determined transmitting antenna array subsets and the determined modulation scheme to the wireless devices to facilitate communication between the transmit cluster and the network access station; and receiving, from a first wireless device of the at least two wireless devices, a transmission based on the determined transmitting antenna array subsets and the determined modulation scheme, the transmission to include information originating from a second wireless device of the at least two wireless devices.