A macrodiversity combining technique for improving the reverse link capacity of CDMA systems

Macroscopic antenna diversity (macrodiversity) is a form of diversity where the branch signals originate from multiple base stations. While some macrodiversity techniques have been employed in modern cellular systems, techniques that employ combining have not been explored as a means of reducing interference in these systems. In CDMA, the use of more sophisticated techniques could significantly reduce multiple access interference and extend the capacity of current and next-generation systems. A novel combining technique based on macrodiversity is presented. The proposed system has been shown to provide significant capacity improvements in simulation, and shows significant promise as a cost-effective upgrade option to cellular service providers.