Method for inter-cell interference coordination in a cellular communication network, network element of a cellular communication network, and cellular communication network

Abstract

A Method for inter-cell interference coordination in a cellular communication network (11) comprising multiple macro base stations (15) controlling at least one of multiple macro cells (13) of the cellular network (11) and at least one pico base station (21) controlling at least one pico cell (19) of the cellular network (11), said pico cell (19) being located at least partially within at least one macro cell (13) comprises—assigning (57) a first portion (B1) of radio transmission resources (53) of the cellular network (11) and a second portion (B2) of said transmission resources (53) to each of said multiple macro base stations (15) for transmitting a radio signal using the first portion (B1) and the second portion (B2) of said transmission resources (53) and—limiting a maximum transmission power of the radio signal to be transmitted using the second portion (B2) to a transmit power limit (Pred) less than a maximum transmit power (PE) of the signal to be transmitted using the first portion (B1). In order to improve an overall throughput of the cellular network (11) and/or the spectral efficiency of transmission resources (53) of the cellular network (11), the method further comprises—assigning (59) the second portion (B2) of said transmission resources (53) to the pico base station (21) for transmitting the radio signal using the second portion (B2) of said transmission resources.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.