US 7,595,753 B2
Broadband beam steering antenna
Mohamed Ratni, Esslingen (Germany)
Assigned to Sony Deutschland GmbH, Berlin (Germany)
Filed on Feb. 28, 2008, as Appl. No. 12/39,238.
Claims priority of application No. 07006737 (EP), filed on Mar. 30, 2007; and application No. 07110213 (EP), filed on Jun. 13, 2007.
Prior Publication US 2008/0238774 A1, Oct. 02, 2008
Int. Cl. H01Q 3/00 (2006.01); H01Q 3/22 (2006.01)
U.S. Cl. 342—375  [342/372] 22 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. An antenna apparatus attachable to a front-end of a transceiver circuitry comprising:
at least two balanced radiation elements arranged to form a planar structure and operable to transmit a corresponding number of partial signals, the balanced radiation elements also being operable to receive the corresponding number of partial signals;
a signal splitter operable to split a signal received from an attached transceiver circuitry into said partial signals, the signal splitter being configured to combine said partial signals into a signal to be transmitted to an attached transceiver circuitry;
a phase shifter device operable to apply relative phase shifts between at least two of said partial signals, said relative phase shifts being selectable from a group of at least two relative phase shift values provided by said phase shifter device,
wherein the phase shifter device includes a number of phase shifter banks according to a number of radiation elements, each phase shifter bank including a plurality of selectable delay lines, each phase shifter bank being operable to shift a phase of a corresponding one of said partial signals using a selected one of said plurality of selectable delay lines.