Patent ID: 7146168

Claim:
A method of providing a downlink soft handover connection in a cellular network, wherein a cell is selected as a primary cell determined in a site selection power control scheme, said method comprising: providing a selection function for selecting said cell of said cellular network based on a comparison of properties of downlink signals received from at least two cells; transmitting a feedback information indicating the result of said selection to a network element controlling said at least two cells; and controlling said at least two cells based on said feedback information so as to establish said downlink connection, wherein said controlling comprises a decision based on a likeness function, said decision being used to determine an estimated primary cell for said downlink connection, and wherein said decision is based on the following decision rule: z = arg ⁢ ⁢ max ⁢ ( ∑ i = 1 b ⁢ Ω i ⁡ ( z ) ) z ∈ { 1 , … ⁢ , b } , wherein z denotes the index of said estimated primary cell for said downlink connection, b denotes the number of active cells, and Ω i denotes the likeness function for the i-th one of said at least two cells.