Comment by ChuckMcM | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ChuckMcM | Hacker News Reader

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As far as I can tell yes, basically its phased-array wi-fi where the system solves for creating channels to individual points rather than beam energy.

If you are familiar with phased array RADAR (as used on AEGIS and other platforms) the system computes on the fly the necessary set of signals from an array of antenna which will constructively interfere to put a 'beam' on the target. AEGIS can track hundreds of targets simultaneously (I believe the actual upper limit is classified)

I recall a startup in the bay area that was doing something like that with WiFi access points to provide both range and better signal integrity (you could exceed the power limits on non-license use going into the antenna as measured output was still within spec), I thought they had been acquired by Atheros but I'll have to dig a bit deeper to find out for sure.

IIRC, there are already companies doing this in the mobile phone space. In essence, they beam steer using slight differences in the arrival time of the signal to actual antennas which in turn causes constructive interference in the desired direction and destructive interference in other locations. For mobile phone networks, this is only for azimuth. For systems like the ones used for AEGIS (the SPY-1 and variants) you get azimuth and elevation beam steering.

Honestly, I can't see this working without stepping on some of the patents owned by companies like ArrayCom and others.

How did they fit enough transmit elements into a cell phone to do that? I thought cell phone antennae were omnidirectional.

That is the big claimed upside of this approach, the cell phone transmitter receiver is very simple, with only 1 antenna. The base station number crunching becomes much more sophisticated, but that is fine.

> I recall a startup in the bay area that was doing something like that with WiFi access points to provide both range and better signal integrity

You may be thinking of Vivato, whose assets were acquired by Catcher.

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