Telecommunications – Transmitter and receiver at same station – Radiotelephone equipment detail
Reexamination Certificate
1997-10-24
2001-04-24
Maung, Nay (Department: 2681)
Telecommunications
Transmitter and receiver at same station
Radiotelephone equipment detail
C455S554100, C455S445000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06223055
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is directed, in general, to wireless telecommunications and, more specifically, to a standards-based wireless office architecture that provides both a wireless extension to a private branch exchange (PBX) system and a seamless interface to a public wireless network.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Public wireless service providers are now facing the maturation of their traditional public service markets as well as increased competition due to the additional market entrants in the Personal Communications System (“PCS”) frequency bands. To counter these growth-diminishing trends, wireless service providers are now looking to grow their businesses by extending their coverage into buildings, to extend and enhance their public system coverage and to provide premium private system services to business and institutional customers.
Current market estimates indicate as much as 35% of the future market for radio base stations may be related to in-building services. The types of premium services being considered include rate discounts based on location for business and high density public service areas, and wireless business services which provide wireless extensions to wired office systems for workers who need to be both mobile and accessible. Wireless service providers are motivated to extend their coverage into buildings to better serve their public users and to grow the potential market of private users.
Expansion of the public system coverage area with improved call quality and reliability can result in increased system usage and revenues. Areas that may be targeted for extended public system coverage include airports, subways, shopping malls, convention centers, sports and entertainment complexes, government facilities and other public institutions. Ideally, the service provided in these public in-building areas should be identical to and transparent with a subscriber's public system service (with the exception that rate discounts based on location may be offered to some subscribers).
Accordingly, what is needed in the art is a wireless office architecture, and method of operation thereof, that extends the services of a private wired PBX to a wireless terminal that operates both onsite and anywhere in a service providers' public coverage area.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
To address the above-discussed deficiencies of the prior art, the present invention provides, in one embodiment, a wireless office architecture that includes: (1) a private branch exchange (“PBX”) having a wired extension and (2) a wireless base station, couplable to the PBX and having a wireless terminal, the wireless terminal associated with the wired extension to allow the wireless base station and the PBX to cooperate to manage the wireless terminal and the wired extension as a unified extension, the wireless base station and the wireless terminal communicating according to a public network standard protocol to allow the wireless terminal to interact both with the wireless base station and in the public network.
Thus, the present invention introduces the broad concept of a wireless office architecture that extends the services of a private wired PBX to a wireless terminal that operates both onsite and anywhere in a service providers' public network.
As used herein, “wireless base station” includes both the singular and plural; i.e., a “wireless base station” may be a single radio communications device or may be, for example, a plurality of distributed radio communications devices that cooperate to provide wireless communications services over a broad physical area.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the wireless base station routes calls from the wireless terminal to another wired extension of the PBX based only on a dialed extension number; i.e., the wireless terminal may access all the conventional features of wired extensions of a PBX.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the wireless base station is a wireless station in the public network.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the wireless base station is located proximate the PBX. Alternatively, the wireless base station, or stations, may be distributed throughout a facility at great distances from the PBX.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the wireless base station routes calls received from a wireless terminal dissociated from the PBX; i.e., a wireless base station may route calls from a wireless terminal regardless of whether the terminal is associated with a wired extension of the PBX. For example, the wireless base station may be associated with a public wireless network and allow for users of the public wireless network to place and receive calls while within the facility having the wireless base station.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the wireless terminal is selected from the group consisting of: (1) a wireless telephone, (2) a pager, and (3) a wireless facsimile machine. In a related embodiment of the present invention, the wireless base station is coupled to a local area network (“LAN”), the wireless terminal being a computer.
The foregoing has outlined, rather broadly, preferred and alternative features of the present invention so that those skilled in the art may better understand the detailed description of the invention that follows. Additional features of the invention will be described hereinafter that form the subject of the claims of the invention. Those skilled in the art should appreciate that they can readily use the disclosed conception and specific embodiment as a basis for designing or modifying other structures for carrying out the same purposes of the present invention. Those skilled in the art should also realize that such equivalent constructions do not depart from the spirit and scope of the invention in its broadest form.
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Lucent Technologies - Inc.
Maung Nay
Vuong Quochien
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